Ohio Supreme Court rejects judge’s claim abortion amendment hinders job
The Ohio Supreme Court dismissed an Ohio judge’s claim that the reproductive rights amendment in the state constitution hindered him from doing his job. Trumbull County Court of Common Pleas Judge David Engler was elected to the county court’s domestic relations and juvenile division in 2024. He argued to the state supreme court in an […]
The Ohio Supreme Court dismissed an Ohio judge’s claim that the reproductive rights amendment in the state constitution hindered him from doing his job.
Trumbull County Court of Common Pleas Judge David Engler was elected to the county court’s domestic relations and juvenile division in 2024. He argued to the state supreme court in an April filing that the constitutional amendment “is being applied to eliminate parental-consent requirements for minors and to render judicial-bypass proceedings unnecessary or unavailable.”
Going further in his court filing, he argued that voters were “not informed” that the constitutional amendment would “eliminate” judicial bypass proceedings.
Judicial bypass is a longstanding legal method minors can use to ask a judge to allow an abortion without the need for parental permission. In judicial bypass cases, judges assess the “maturity and voluntariness” of a request via hearings and testimony, according to documents related to Engler’s court filing.
“The omission (of the judicial bypass proceedings) concealed a consequence essential to both advocates and opponents, and prevented average voters from understanding that the measure would alter the judiciary’s structure,” Engler wrote to the court.
The judge asked the court to dictate the administration and enforcement of the amendment “in a manner that preserves and does not eliminate or interfere with juvenile-court jurisdiction over judicial-bypass proceedings.”
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Judicial bypass has been a method since the late 1990s. Engler’s county of Trumbull only saw two judicial bypass requests per year in the five years before he took the bench. In the year since he took over as judge, that number dropped to zero, leading Engler to say his office “has been stripped of a statutory and historically exercised judicial function.”
The reproductive rights amendment was passed by 57% of Ohio voters in 2023, enshrining abortion rights, miscarriage treatment, and other reproductive health measures into the state’s founding document.
The judge’s claims were countered by groups like the ACLU of Ohio and the Reproductive Rights Law Initiative at Case Western Reserve School of Law, along with the Ohio Attorney General’s Office.
Requesting that the court dismiss Engler’s claims, the state attorney general’s office called Engler’s arguments “untimely.” The office and the organizations who filed court documents in opposition to Engler’s request said he did not provide evidence that the constitutional amendment had specifically caused the drop in judicial bypass cases.
“(Engler) has alleged only that fewer judicial bypass cases have happened to arise in Trumbull County recently,” the ACLU of Ohio wrote in court documents. “That allegation is manifestly insufficient to support an inference that parental consent laws for abortion are no longer being enforced in Ohio.”
The Ohio Supreme Court dismissed the case without filing an opinion explaining the dismissal. The court’s announcement noted that the decision was agreed to by Chief Justice Sharon Kennedy and all six of the other justices on the court.
Abortion rights advocacy group Abortion Forward praised the decision in a recent email newsletter.
“While this case was transparently political, it does provide a valuable example of the potential for judicial interference in abortion politics in Ohio, even with the constitutional guarantee in place,” the newsletter stated.