A Wisconsin circuit court judge has ruled that an 1849 law that classifies the destruction of a fetus by someone other than the mother as a felony does not outlaw abortions, returning the state’s abortion access to its pre-Dobbs status.
Dane County Circuit Court Judge Diane Schlipper on Tuesday reaffirmed a ruling she issued earlier this year, finding that an 1800s-era law “does not apply to consensual abortions, but to feticide.”
After the Supreme Court overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling in 2022, the question was raised over whether a Wisconsin state law passed in 1849 could go into effect. Roe had effectively invalidated the law when it was in effect.
For better or worse, laws apply from when they are enacted to when they are repealed or superseded. (Repealed includes laws with clauses that state it only applies for X years or that it needs to be renewed every Y years and the law doesn’t get renewed.)
That being said, there are all too often laws that are technically applicable but whose usefulness has long since passed. In these cases, the law still applies but the state legislature needs to pass a bill to repeal it (or supersede it).
All laws need a fairly short sunset clause, actively renewing laws is important.
Congrats, you’ve just passed every conservative’s wet dream, by not only making it harder to pass any new laws because you’re constantly going to be busy renewing the old ones, but also making it so that all you have to do in order to kill a policy you don’t like is to wait and do nothing.
Imagine if Republicans could kill Social Security by simply waiting and fillibustering in the Senate, and go on to blame Democrats because they technically have a majority.
The hooligans controlling the US House of Representatives are the perfect example of why you wouldn’t want that.
“The legislation forbidding companies from dumping toxic waste in rivers is not going to be renewed unless we also pass a ban on all Muslim immigration to the US!”
“We’re not going to renew animal abuse laws unless we also donate $100 million of our budget to each of the Fortune 500 companies!”
“We’re not going to renew Hours of Service regulations and the 40 hour work week unless we outlaw gay marriage!”
And real examples you see all the time. The Republicans on several occassions have used “then we’re not going to pay our bills” as a bargaining chip (debt ceiling crises).
Nah, we all agree that murder is bad and should always be illegal. We don’t need to sunset that one.
There’s obviously a practical approach between “all laws must sunset” and “laws never expire or change.”
There is more to laws than a binary “legal or not” determination. They also include how a crime is to be punished. That part of a law is much more sensitive to shifting cultural standards.
Take for example the discussions regarding murdering in self-defense. It used be treated like any other murder, but we realized that it was unfair to would-be victims. That’s how we got “stand your ground” laws. However now people are criticizing these laws for encouraging murder and paranoia, a significantly unintended consequence. There been difficulty addressing “stand your ground” because they are entrenched into case law.
A sunset clause would give easier access to the people for reassessment of “stand your ground.”
Sure, there are places where they can make sense. I didn’t say that there should be no sunset clauses, just that not all laws should automatically sunset.
All that means is there’s a time limit on your democracy where you get to a point where you can’t pass any new laws because you’re too busy re-passing the old ones.