The Wisconsin Supreme Court struck down the state’s 176-year-old near-total abortion ban, ruling 4–3 that a web of modern statutes regulating the procedure implicitly repealed the 1849 law criminalising the “intentional destruction” of a fetus. Writing for the majority, Justice Rebecca Dallet said decades of legislation covering where, when and how abortions may be performed had supplanted the 19th-century prohibition, meaning prosecutors can no longer charge doctors under that statute. The decision affirms a 2023 Dane County ruling and ends a lawsuit filed by Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul, who argued that newer regulations—most notably a 1985 measure allowing abortions up to fetal viability, roughly the 20-week mark—govern the issue. Sheboygan County District Attorney Joel Urmanski, backed by anti-abortion groups, had sought to enforce the old ban after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. Conservative Justices Annette Ziegler, Rebecca Bradley and Brian Hagedorn dissented, calling the move a “jaw-dropping exercise of judicial will” that rewrites state law. Their opinions underscore the ideological divide on a court that flipped to a liberal majority following two fiercely contested elections that together drew more than $100 million in spending, the highest total ever for U.S. judicial races. Governor Tony Evers and Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin welcomed the ruling as a safeguard for patients and providers, while Wisconsin Right to Life and Pro-Life Wisconsin condemned it and vowed to push for renewed restrictions through the legislature. The high court separately dismissed as moot a parallel constitutional challenge from Planned Parenthood, leaving abortion access in the state governed by the post-viability limits embedded in existing statutes.