San Francisco Judge Removes Circumcision Ban From Ballot

San Francisco residents will not be voting on whether male circumcisions should be banned in the city this fall.

A Superior Court judge ordered Thursday that the proposed measure, which had initially made it onto the November 8 city ballot, be removed entirely.

The measure proposed banning male circumcisions with the penalty of jail time or a $1,000 fine. It would not have granted religious exemptions.

From the beginning, the controversial ballot measure faced strong resistance from medical, religious and civil liberties groups.

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Superior Court Judge Loretta Giorgi wrote that male circumcision is "a widely practiced medical procedure" and that medical services are left to the regulation of the state, not individual cities.

The judge's ruling was hailed by the Jewish Community Relations Council, the Anti-Defamation League and others who had sued to remove the measure from the ballot.

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