South Dakota's Abortion Revolt

South Dakota touched off a national tempest with its strict new abortion ban, but the law also fomented a local grassroots movement and opened a schism in the state's dominant Republican Party.

In a state with only one abortion clinic staffed by a doctor who visits from Minnesota, the issue now is poised to dominate this year's state elections, in which the governor's office and all 35 state Senate seats and 70 House seats are on the ballot.

The new law--intended to set up a legal challenge to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court landmark ruling legalizing abortion--makes it a felony for anyone to help a woman end her pregnancy, even in cases of rape and incest or when the woman's physical or mental health is at risk. The law only permits abortion when it is necessary to save a woman's life. Opponents are gathering signatures for a ballot initiative to overturn the law. Republican legislators who voted for South Dakota's ban are attracting both Democratic and Republican campaign challengers. And Republican Gov. Mike Rounds, who signed the bill on March 6, has seen his support drop 20 percent, according to state polls.

If the ballot initiative fails and the law takes effect, the tribal president of the Oglala Sioux Indian Nation in South Dakota--territory that would be immune to the state law--already has vowed to build an abortion clinic on the reservation for all women in the state.

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