Facts
- Pennsylvania amended its Abortion Control Act to require informed consent with specified disclosures and a 24-hour waiting period, parental consent for minors with a judicial bypass, spousal notification for married women, specified medical-emergency exceptions, and provider reporting and recordkeeping.
- Abortion clinics and a physician brought a federal facial challenge seeking declaratory and injunctive relief before the provisions took effect.
- The district court held the challenged provisions unconstitutional and enjoined enforcement.
- The Third Circuit upheld the informed-consent/waiting-period requirement, parental consent with bypass, the medical-emergency definition, and reporting requirements, but struck down spousal notification.
- The Supreme Court granted review and considered whether to retain or overrule Roe v. Wade and how to evaluate abortion regulations.
Issues
- Whether the Constitution protects a woman’s right to choose abortion before fetal viability and whether Roe v. Wade should be overruled.
- What standard governs the constitutionality of state abortion regulations prior to viability.
- Whether Pennsylvania’s informed consent/24-hour waiting period, parental consent with judicial bypass, spousal notification, medical-emergency definition, and reporting requirements violate the Fourteenth Amendment.
Decision
- The Court reaffirmed Roe’s “essential holding” that the Constitution protects a right to choose abortion before viability and that, after viability, the state may prohibit abortion with exceptions for the woman’s life or health.
- The Court rejected Roe’s trimester framework and replaced it with the “undue burden” standard for pre-viability regulations.
- The Court held the spousal-notification requirement unconstitutional because it created an undue burden for a significant subset of married women.
- The Court upheld the informed-consent and 24-hour waiting-period provisions, concluding they were not undue burdens.
- The Court upheld parental consent for minors because the judicial bypass prevented the requirement from operating as a substantial obstacle.
- The Court upheld the reporting and recordkeeping provisions as permissible health and regulatory measures that did not impose a substantial obstacle.
- The Court affirmed the Third Circuit’s invalidation of spousal notification and otherwise largely sustained the remaining provisions, with remand for further proceedings consistent with the opinion.
Legal Principles
- The Constitution protects a woman’s right to choose abortion prior to viability without state action that has the purpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in her path.
- A pre-viability abortion regulation is invalid if it imposes an “undue burden,” defined as a substantial obstacle to obtaining a pre-viability abortion.
- The state may further interests in maternal health and potential life throughout pregnancy and may express a preference for childbirth through truthful, non-misleading information, so long as it does not impose an undue burden.
- After viability, the state may regulate and proscribe abortion, but must allow exceptions necessary to protect the woman’s life or health.
- In evaluating burdens, the Court assessed whether a provision operates as a substantial obstacle for a “large fraction” of women for whom it is relevant.
Conclusion
The Court retained the constitutional protection for pre-viability abortion and the viability line, replaced Roe’s trimester framework with the undue-burden test, invalidated spousal notification as a substantial obstacle, and upheld informed consent with a waiting period, parental consent with judicial bypass, and reporting requirements as permissible regulations.