Arizona lawmakers repeal 1864 abortion ban
PHOENIX — Arizona lawmakers voted Wednesday to repeal an abortion ban that first became law when Abraham Lincoln was president and a half-century before women won the right to vote.
A bill to repeal the law passed 16-14 in the Republican-controlled state Senate with the support of every Democratic senator and two Republicans who broke with anti-abortion conservatives in their own party. It now goes to Gov. Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, who is expected to sign it.
The vote was the culmination of a fevered effort to repeal the law that has made abortion a central focus of Arizona’s politics.
The issue has galvanized Democratic voters and energized a campaign to put an abortion-rights ballot measure before Arizona voters in November. On the right, it created a rift between anti-abortion activists who want to keep the law in place and Republican politicians who worry about the political backlash that could be prompted by support of a near-total abortion ban with no exceptions for rape or incest.
The 1864 law had gathered dust on the books for decades. But it exploded into an election-year flashpoint three weeks ago when a 4-2 decision by the state Supreme Court, whose justices are all Republican-appointed, said the ban could now be enforced because of the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
