## Facts

- New Hampshire enacted the Parental Notification Prior to Abortion Act, requiring physicians to wait 48 hours after delivering written notice of a minor’s abortion to a parent or guardian.
- The Act provided an exception when an abortion was necessary to prevent the minor’s death and there was insufficient time to provide notice.
- The Act allowed a minor to seek judicial authorization (a bypass) to proceed without parental notification.
- The Act did not expressly allow an exception for medical emergencies threatening serious harm to the minor’s health (short of death).
- Abortion providers sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging the Act was unconstitutional because it lacked a health exception and because the life exception and bypass confidentiality were inadequate.
- The district court declared the Act unconstitutional and permanently enjoined enforcement; the First Circuit affirmed.
- The Supreme Court addressed the appropriate remedy, assuming that some emergency-health applications would be unconstitutional.

## Issues

1. When a statute regulating abortions is unconstitutional in some medical-emergency applications, must a court invalidate the statute in full, or may it issue narrower declaratory and injunctive relief limited to unconstitutional applications?
2. What severability and remedial principles govern whether courts should preserve valid applications of such a statute consistent with legislative intent?

## Decision

- The Supreme Court unanimously vacated the First Circuit’s judgment and remanded.
- The Court treated as settled that (1) states may require parental involvement for minors, and (2) a state may not restrict abortions necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, to preserve the pregnant person’s life or health.
- Because New Hampshire conceded unconstitutional applications would arise in a small set of serious health-emergency situations, the Court held the lower courts erred by striking down the Act in its entirety without first considering narrower relief.
- On remand, the lower courts were instructed to examine state law and legislative intent to determine whether unconstitutional applications could be severed or enjoined without invalidating the whole statute.

## Legal Principles

- When confronting a statute’s constitutional flaw, courts should, where feasible, “limit the solution to the problem” by enjoining only unconstitutional applications rather than invalidating the statute facially.
- Courts may sever problematic portions of a statute and leave the remainder in force when consistent with legislative intent and state severability principles.
- The scope of judicial relief should avoid nullifying more of a legislature’s work than necessary, particularly when unconstitutional applications are narrow and identifiable.
- Remedial design in constitutional challenges may require close attention to state law on severability and the statute’s operation absent the unconstitutional applications.

## Conclusion

The Court held that even if New Hampshire’s parental-notification statute could not be constitutionally applied in certain health-emergency situations, lower courts should first consider severance or injunctions limited to those applications, rather than automatically invalidating the statute in full.


Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of N. New Eng., 546 U.S. 320 (2006)