The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a lower court ruling that struck down North Carolina’s law requiring mothers to obtain an ultrasound prior to killing their child via abortion.

The court agreed with the lower court that the requirement is unconstitutional because it violates the “right to free speech.”

North Carolina lawmakers passed the Women’s Right to Know Act in 2011, which required women to obtain an ultrasound prior to an abortion, and that the abortionist describe the child’s features to the mother, as well as offer the opportunity to listen to the baby’s heartbeat.  The governor at the time, Beverly Purdue vetoed the bill because of her endorsement of abortion.  The legislators overruled the veto.

Mega-abortionist Planned Parenthood, the ACLU and the Center For Reproductive Rights sued to block the law and it was struck down by Obama-appointed U.S. District Judge Catherine Eagles as “an impermissible attempt to compel providers to deliver the state’s message in favor of childbirth and against abortion.”

“This compelled speech, even though it is a regulation of the medical profession, is ideological in intent and in kind,” the panel wrote in support of Eagles’ ruling. “The First Amendment not only protects against prohibitions of speech, but also against regulations that compel speech. A regulation compelling speech is by its very nature content-based, because it requires the speaker to change the content of his speech or even to say something where he would otherwise be silent.”

Attorney General Roy Cooper, who said he personally opposes the law, said he will appeal because it’s his responsibility to defense state law regardless of his personal beliefs.