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A federal appeals court Monday ruled that a North Carolina abortion law requiring doctors to perform ultrasounds and describe sonogram images to women is unconstitutional because it violates free speech rights. ... A provision in the Women's Right to Know Act requires doctors to display sonogram images of fetuses and to describe them to women at least four hours before an abortion procedure. "Transforming the physician into the mouthpiece of the state undermines the trust that is necessary for facilitating healthy doctor-patient relationships and, through them, successful treatment outcomes," the three-judge panel wrote. (Zucchino, 12/22)

A North Carolina law requiring abortion providers to show and describe an ultrasound to the pregnant woman is "ideological in intent" and violates doctors' free-speech rights, a federal appeals court ruled Monday. Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III wrote that the law goes far beyond what most states have done to ensure that a woman gives informed consent to an abortion. (O'Dell, 12/22)

A North Carolina law that required physicians to perform an ultrasound, display the sonogram and describe the fetus to women seeking abortions is unconstitutional, a federal appeals court ruled Monday. The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in Richmond, Va., upheld a district judge’s decision striking down the 2011 law, which was passed by North Carolina’s Republican-led legislature over a veto by Gov. Bev Perdue, a Democrat. (12/22)