In April, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled to reinstate a near-total ban on abortions from 1864, created before Arizona became a state, providing exceptions only in cases where the life of the mother was in danger. It was the decision that impacted millions of women across our state and thrust Arizona into a heated, nationwide debate over reproductive rights.
A short time later, the Arizona legislature would move to repeal the 1864 law, paving the way for a 15-week ban to take effect which was approved the legislature in 2022 and signed by former Governor Doug Ducey shortly thereafter.
ABC15's Nick Ciletti recently followed up with Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Ann Timmer, who authored the dissent in the 4-2 case, to gain more insight into what went into making such a historic decision.
As a judge, Chief Justice Timmer says there are cases where the potential impact of a decision is undeniable.
"You're aware of the weight, but it doesn't change the result."
And the case that quite possibly carried the heaviest weight this term was the abortion ruling, paving the way for the 1864 near-total ban on the procedure to take effect.
Arizonans from all walks of life had no shortage of opinions.
Chief Justice Timmer, then Vice Chief, disagreed with that majority decision and authored the dissent.
In part of her dissent, Chief Justice Timmer wrote, "we simply disagree vehemently with what the law says," and ABC15's Nick Ciletti recently asked her about that.
"Vehemently. Yes. We did...You asked earlier does the weight of a decision have an influence - It doesn't on the outcome. It does in the writing very often. We were all very cognizant of the fact that this decision of course is going to get a lot of attention...I knew they [the other justices] would be accused of...'Well, they're not doing their job. They're being very unfair,' and all of these things and not deciding the case on how they say the law. I wanted to give that juxtaposition by saying, 'Hey, we disagree with them, vehemently, to show you how strongly we do disagree with them,' and I think if you read the whole dissent, you'd see we pretty strongly disagree. But these are just judges doing what they think they're supposed to be doing, deciding the law as they interpret it."
Chief Justice Timmer goes on to describe it as legal gray areas.
"And there is room for disagreement. That's what I wanted to communicate to people reading that. That there is room for disagreement. It doesn't mean the judges are not following the law; they just see it differently than we see it. And there is a remedy for that. And that is to go down to the legislature."
Which is exactly what happened.
Eventually, Arizona lawmakers put forward a bill to repeal the 1864 law which Governor Katie Hobbs would eventually sign, striking down it down for good.
When it comes to other decisions that may carry a lot of magnitude, Chief Justice Timmer invoked a Star Trek reference called, "Kobayashi Maru," which represents a no-win scenario.
"This is the kind of case where no matter which way you decide it, someone is going to say, 'Well, that's just because they're being unfair. That's because they're, in this case, either pro-life or they're anti-abortion,' or those kind of things. You can't get around it. In a way, that just takes a load off, frankly...There's only one thing you can do which is exactly what you're supposed to do which is you read the law, you read the constitution and you interpret as it should be interpreted and you apply it as fairly as you can."
Arizona voters will now get to decide on abortion. The group Arizona Abortion Access gathered enough signatures to get Prop 139 on the ballot. A 'yes' vote would give women the right to have abortions until the point of viability, typically around 24 weeks. The protections would then be added to the Arizona Constitution.
Currently, there are seven Arizona Supreme Court justices. Each justice is appointed by the Governor. After their first two years serving on the bench, the justice is up for a retention election from Arizona voters. They're not up for a vote again for another six years and will face a retention election every six years
Arizona law requires justices to retire at the age of 70.
The Governor appoints justices to the Supreme Court but is required to pick from a submitted list of applicants, assembled by a bipartisan commission known as the Commission of Appellate Court Appointments.
