WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court ducked another abortion case Friday, refusing to let Alabama defend its ban on a second-term method of abortion that was struck down last year.

The justices, who already have turned down opportunities to hear abortion cases from Louisiana and Indiana, denied the state's petition to have its ban on dilation & evacuation abortions heard next term.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit clearly sympathized with the state last year but ruled that the Supreme Court's precedents on abortion required that the ban be struck down.

"The method involves tearing apart and extracting piece-by-piece from the uterus what was until then a living unborn child," Chief Judge Ed Carnes wrote. "This is usually done during the 15-to-18 week stage of development, at which time the unborn child’s heart is already beating."

However, Carnes wrote, "In our judicial system, there is only one Supreme Court, and we are not it."

The Supreme Court first put the case on its list for consideration in March but delayed action until now. In the meantime, it upheld an Indiana law requiring the burial or cremation of fetal remains following an abortion. But it refused to consider that state's effort to ban abortions based on sex, race or disability.

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Associate Justice Clarence Thomas agreed with the decision to deny hearing the case, but he wrote separately to complain that the Supreme Court's "undue burden" test for women seeking an abortion blocks laws such as Alabama's and Indiana's.

"This case serves as a stark reminder that our abortion jurisprudence has spiraled out of control," Thomas wrote. "None of these decisions is supported by the text of the Constitution. Although this case does not present the opportunity to address our demonstrably erroneous 'undue burden' standard, we cannot continue blinking the reality of what this court has wrought."

The Alabama law is among many challenging the timing, methods and providers of abortion that are headed toward the high court at a time when Chief Justice John Roberts and some of his colleagues have been seeking a lower profile.

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That may not last for long. In February, the court temporarily blocked abortion restrictions in Louisiana that critics complained were virtually identical to Texas limits struck down by the justices in 2016. But it's likely the court will hear the state's appeal next term.

Less likely to win the justices' consideration are laws passed recently in Georgia, Ohio, Missouri, Kentucky and Mississippi that ban most abortions. Those laws more clearly conflict with the high court's precedents.

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