Edelin Forestalled

The state's Supreme Judicial Court last week postponed until March the hearing of an appeal by Dr. Kenneth C. Edelin of his manslaughter conviction.

The appeal was scheduled to be held this week, but because retiring Chief Justice Joseph Tauro cannot sit on the case, it is slated for the first full week of March, when a full complement of seven justices should be in session.

Edelin, a Boston City Hospital obstetrician, was convicted in February in the Suffolk County Superior Court for the death of a fetus following a legal abortion he performed in October 1973.

Assistant District Attorney Newman A. Flanagan, the prosecutor in the case, said yesterday that he does not expect the case to be heard until April, two years after Edelin was indicted.

Flanagan said that failure to appoint a new justice and his own plans for March could delay the proceedings.

Defense and prosecution "were both quite truthfully anxious to have it argued in December," Flanagan added.