    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1996, Book I)]
    [April 10, 1996]
    [Pages 567-568]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Message to the House of Representatives Returning Without Approval
    Partial Birth Abortion Legislation
    April 10, 1996

    To the House of Representatives:
        I am returning herewith without my approval H.R. 1833, which would
    prohibit doctors from performing a certain kind of abortion. I do so
    because the bill does not allow women to protect themselves from serious
    threats to their health. By refusing to permit women, in reliance on
    their doctors' best medical judgment, to use this procedure when their
    lives are threatened or when their health is put in serious jeopardy,
    the Congress has fashioned a bill that is consistent neither with the
    Constitution nor with sound public policy.
        I have always believed that the decision to have an abortion
    generally should be between a woman, her doctor, her conscience, and her
    God. I support the decision in Roe v. Wade protecting a woman's right to
    choose, and I believe that the abortions protected by that decision
    should be safe and rare. Consistent with that decision, I have long
    opposed late-term abortions except where necessary to protect the life
    or health of the mother. In fact, as Governor of Arkansas, I signed into
    law a bill that barred third trimester abortions, with an appropriate
    exception for life or health.
        The procedure described in H.R. 1833 has troubled me deeply, as it
    has many people. I cannot support use of that procedure on an elective
    basis, where the abortion is being performed for non-health related
    reasons and there are equally safe medical procedures available.
        There are, however, rare and tragic situations that can occur in a
    woman's pregnancy in which, in a doctor's medical judgment, the use of
    this procedure may be necessary to save a woman's life or to protect her
    against serious injury to her health. In these situations, in which a
    woman and her family must make an awful choice, the Constitution
    requires, as it should, that the ability to choose this procedure be
    protected.
        In the past several months, I have heard from women who desperately
    wanted to have their babies, who were devastated to learn that their
    babies had fatal conditions and would not live, who wanted anything
    other than an abortion, but who were advised by their doctors that this
    procedure was their best chance to avert the risk of death or grave harm
    which, in some cases, would have included an inability to ever bear
    children again. For these women, this was

    [[Page 568]]

    not about choice--not about deciding against having a child. These
    babies were certain to perish before, during or shortly after birth, and
    the only question was how much grave damage was going to be done to the
    woman.
        I cannot sign H.R. 1833, as passed, because it fails to protect
    women in such dire circumstances--because by treating doctors who
    perform the procedure in these tragic cases as criminals, the bill poses
    a danger of serious harm to women. This bill, in curtailing the ability
    of women and their doctors to choose the procedure for sound medical
    reasons, violates the constitutional command that any law regulating
    abortion protect both the life and the health of the woman. The bill's
    overbroad criminal prohibition risks that women will suffer serious
    injury.
        That is why I implored Congress to add an exemption for the small
    number of compelling cases where selection of the procedure, in the
    medical judgment of the attending physician, was necessary to preserve
    the life of the woman or avert serious adverse consequences to her
    health. The life exception in the current bill only covers cases where
    the doctor believes that the woman will die. It fails to cover cases
    where, absent the procedure, serious physical harm, often including
    losing the ability to have more children, is very likely to occur. I
    told Congress that I would sign H.R. 1833 if it were amended to add an
    exception for serious health consequences. A bill amended in this way
    would strike a proper balance, remedying the constitutional and human
    defect of H.R. 1833. If such a bill were presented to me, I would sign
    it now.
        I understand the desire to eliminate the use of a procedure that
    appears inhumane. But to eliminate it without taking into consideration
    the rare and tragic circumstances in which its use may be necessary
    would be even more inhumane.
        The Congress chose not to adopt the sensible and constitutionally
    appropriate proposal I made, instead leaving women unprotected against
    serious health risks. As a result of this Congressional indifference to
    women's health, I cannot, in good conscience and consistent with my
    responsibility to uphold the law, sign this legislation.

                                                          William J. Clinton

    The White House,

    April 10, 1996.