Florida governor signs abortion bill ending funding to clinics News
Florida governor signs abortion bill ending funding to clinics

[JURIST] Florida Governor Rick Scott [official website] on Friday signed a bill [HB 1411 materials] into law that will cut off state funding to clinics providing abortions as well as impose more restrictions on abortions in the state. The law, which has been publicly criticized by Planned Parenthood [advocacy website], bans state funding for services at clinics that provide abortions, on top of the ban on state funding for abortions that was already in place. The law also will require doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges within a reasonable distance of their clinics. Scott signed into law 68 other bills on Friday and commented on some of them but refused to comment on the abortion bill. The bill passed the Republican-controlled legislature earlier this month, and many other states are passing similar bills.

Abortion procedures and reproductive rights issues [JURIST backgrounder] have been controversial topics throughout the US. Last week Indiana Governor Mike Pence signed a controversial bill [JURIST] banning abortions motivated by concerns of the fetus’ gender, race or potential disabilities. Earlier this month a district court judge blocked [JURIST report] Arkansas from enforcing a bill mandating abortion pill providers to follow US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) guidelines and requiring hospital admittance privileges to handle complications. Also this month West Virginia lawmakers overrode the governor’s veto to enact a new law [JURIST report] that prevents the dilation and evacuation abortion procedure, widely held to be the safest second-trimester abortion method. South Dakota’s governor signed a bill [JURIST report] that bans abortions after 20 weeks. Last month the Oklahoma Supreme Court reversed [JURIST report] a lower court decision upholding a law that restricts use of medication abortion drugs.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Night of the Murdered Poets takes place in USSR

Soviet authorities under Josef Stalin executed a group of 13 Jewish intellectuals from the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, an organization dedicated to supporting the Soviet war effort against Nazi Germany, on August 12, 1952. The 13 stood accused of supporting the US and Zionism as well as trying to create an independent republic in Crimea, which all but one falsely confessed to under torture. Learn more about the Night of the Murdered Poets from the World Jewish Congress and Forward. Also read a history of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee from the Jewish Virtual Library.

Swiss banks agreed to compensate Holocaust victims for holding assets

On August 12, 1998, Swiss banks agreed to pay $1.25 billion to settle lawsuits brought by Holocaust survivors and their heirs. The plaintiffs had alleged that the banks had kept millions of dollars deposited by Holocaust victims before and during World War II. Read CNN's original report of the story.

City of Chicago founded

On August 12, 1833, the City of Chicago was founded. The city was later formally incorporated with a town charter on March 4, 1837.
Learn more about the history of Chicago's charter from the Encyclopedia of Chicago.

Former Japan PM convicted of accepting bribes

On August 12, 1983, the former Prime Minister of Japan, Tanaka Kakuei was convicted of accepting bribes while in office and sentenced to 4 years in jail. He came to be described as "the paragon of post war corruption" for taking money from the defense contractor Boeing in exchange for favorable contracts. Also on this day, Nikita Kruschev famously banged his shoe on the table during a heated argument before the United Nations General Assembly.