Case Title: Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida v. State of Florida

Citation: 

Docket Number: SC2022-1050, SC2022-1127

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 2024-04-01T00:00:00Z

Document:
Supreme Court of Florida 
 
____________ 
 
No. SC2022-1050 
____________ 
 
PLANNED PARENTHOOD OF SOUTHWEST AND CENTRAL 
FLORIDA, et al., 
Petitioners, 
 
vs. 
 
STATE OF FLORIDA, et al., 
Respondents. 
 
____________ 
 
No. SC2022-1127 
____________ 
 
PLANNED PARENTHOOD OF SOUTHWEST AND CENTRAL 
FLORIDA, et al., 
Petitioners, 
 
vs. 
 
STATE OF FLORIDA, et al., 
Respondents. 
 
April 1, 2024 
 
GROSSHANS, J. 
 
The Florida Constitution guarantees “the right to be let alone 
and free from governmental intrusion into . . . private life.”  Art. I, 
 
- 2 - 
§ 23, Fla. Const.  In this case, we are asked to determine if there is 
a conflict between the rights secured by this provision and a 
recently amended statute that shortens the window of time in which 
a physician may perform an abortion.  See ch. 2022-69, § 4, Laws 
of Fla. (codified at section 390.0111(1), Florida Statutes (2022)). 
The parties have presented thoughtful arguments as to the 
scope of this provision, which has traditionally been referred to as 
the “Privacy Clause.”  Those legal arguments on the Privacy 
Clause’s meaning are, in our view, distinct from the serious moral, 
ethical, and policy issues that are implicated in the subject matter 
of this case.  Our analysis focuses on the Privacy Clause’s text, its 
context, and the historical evidence surrounding its adoption.  After 
considering each of these sources and consistent with longstanding 
principles of judicial deference to legislative enactments, we 
conclude there is no basis under the Privacy Clause to invalidate 
the statute.  In doing so, we recede from our prior decisions in 
which—relying on reasoning the U.S. Supreme Court has rejected—
we held that the Privacy Clause guaranteed the right to receive an 
abortion through the end of the second trimester.  See generally In 
re T.W., 551 So. 2d 1186 (Fla. 1989); N. Fla. Women’s Health & 
 
- 3 - 
Counseling Servs., Inc. v. State, 866 So. 2d 612 (Fla. 2003); 
Gainesville Woman Care, LLC v. State, 210 So. 3d 1243 (Fla. 2017). 
For this reason, petitioners are not entitled to the temporary 
injunction granted by the trial court, and we approve the outcome 
reached by the First District Court of Appeal below.1 
I 
This case involves a constitutional challenge to an amended 
Florida statute prohibiting abortions “if the physician determines 
the gestational age of the fetus is more than 15 weeks.”  
§ 390.0111(1), Fla. Stat. (2022); ch. 2022-69, § 8, Laws of Fla. 
(providing effective date of July 1, 2022).  This prohibition does not 
apply if any of the following occurs:  
(a) Two physicians certify in writing that, in reasonable 
medical judgment, the termination of the pregnancy is 
necessary to save the pregnant woman’s life or avert a 
serious risk of substantial and irreversible physical 
impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant 
woman other than a psychological condition. 
 
(b) The physician certifies in writing that, in reasonable 
medical judgment, there is a medical necessity for 
legitimate emergency medical procedures for termination 
of the pregnancy to save the pregnant woman’s life or 
avert a serious risk of imminent substantial and 
 
1.  We have jurisdiction.  See art. V, § 3(b)(3), Fla. Const. 
(express-and-direct conflict). 
 
- 4 - 
irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily 
function of the pregnant woman other than a 
psychological condition, and another physician is not 
available for consultation. 
 
(c) The fetus has not achieved viability under s. 
390.01112 and two physicians certify in writing that, in 
reasonable medical judgment, the fetus has a fatal fetal 
abnormality. 
 
§ 390.0111(1)(a)-(c).  Prior to this change, the statute had restricted 
only late-term abortions.2  
After this new law took effect, seven abortion clinics and one 
medical doctor (collectively Planned Parenthood)3 sued the State 
and others.  Planned Parenthood alleged that the statute violated 
the Privacy Clause, which was added to the Florida Constitution in 
1980.  Located within the Declaration of Rights, the clause provides 
in full: 
 
2.  Specifically, the statute said, “No termination of pregnancy 
shall be performed on any human being in the third trimester of 
pregnancy unless one of [two] conditions is met.”  § 390.0111(1), 
Fla. Stat. (2021) (emphasis added). 
 
3.  The eight plaintiffs are Planned Parenthood of Southwest 
and Central Florida; Planned Parenthood of South, East, and North 
Florida; Gainesville Woman Care, LLC; A Woman’s Choice of 
Jacksonville, Inc.; Indian Rocks Woman’s Center, Inc.; St. 
Petersburg Woman’s Health Center, Inc.; Tampa Woman’s Health 
Center, Inc.; and Dr. Shelly Hsiao-Ying Tien. 
 
- 5 - 
SECTION 23. Right of privacy.—Every natural person has 
the right to be let alone and free from governmental 
intrusion into the person’s private life except as otherwise 
provided herein.  This section shall not be construed to 
limit the public’s right of access to public records and 
meetings as provided by law. 
 
With the complaint, Planned Parenthood filed a motion for 
temporary injunction, asking the trial court to block enforcement of 
the statute until it could rule on the merits of the constitutional 
challenge.  In part, Planned Parenthood claimed that it was 
substantially likely to prevail in the lawsuit because it could 
demonstrate that the statute violates the Privacy Clause.  In 
addition, Planned Parenthood argued that pregnant Floridians 
would be irreparably harmed absent a temporary injunction 
because the statute “would prohibit [them] from obtaining essential 
medical care and force them to remain pregnant and continue 
enduring the risks of pregnancy against their will.”  The statute, 
Planned Parenthood said, would also cause irreparable harm to 
itself and its staff by subjecting them to potential punitive 
consequences and interfering with the doctor-patient relationship. 
The State opposed Planned Parenthood’s request for a 
temporary injunction.  It argued that Planned Parenthood lacked 
 
- 6 - 
standing to assert the privacy rights of its patients and, on the 
merits, could not establish any of the four requirements for a 
temporary injunction, let alone all four.4 
After the State submitted its response, the U.S. Supreme 
Court issued a landmark decision on abortion in a case involving a 
Mississippi statute.  See Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Org., 
597 U.S. 215 (2022).  In that decision, the Court ruled that the 
federal constitution does not guarantee a right to abortion.  Id. at 
231, 235-63, 292, 295.  Based on this holding, the Court 
overturned Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), and Planned 
Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 
(1992)—cases which had recognized a broad right to abortion under 
federal law.  Dobbs, 597 U.S. at 292, 302 (expressly overruling Roe 
and Casey).  In overruling those decisions, Dobbs “returned to the 
people and their elected representatives” “the authority to regulate 
abortion.”  Id. at 292. 
 
4.  Under Florida law, a party seeking a temporary injunction 
must prove four things: “(1) a substantial likelihood of success on 
the merits, (2) the unavailability of an adequate remedy at law, (3) 
irreparable harm absent entry of an injunction, and (4) that the 
injunction would serve the public interest.”  Fla. Dep’t of Health v. 
Florigrown, LLC, 317 So. 3d 1101, 1110 (Fla. 2021). 
 
- 7 - 
Several days after Dobbs issued, the trial court in this case 
held an evidentiary hearing on Planned Parenthood’s motion for 
temporary injunction.  Planned Parenthood called one witness and 
offered several exhibits.  The State also presented witness testimony 
and documentary evidence. 
Deeming Planned Parenthood’s evidence persuasive, the trial 
court entered a temporary injunction.  It found that Planned 
Parenthood had third-party standing and satisfied all four 
temporary-injunction elements.  In finding a likelihood of success 
on the merits, the court relied on our abortion jurisprudence.  
See generally T.W., 551 So. 2d at 1191-94 (Privacy Clause 
encompasses abortion); N. Fla. Women’s Health, 866 So. 2d at 639 
(reaffirming T.W.); Gainesville Woman Care, 210 So. 3d at 1246, 
1253-55 (relying on T.W.).  The court concluded that the statute 
was subject to strict scrutiny under that case law and determined 
that it either did not serve compelling interests or, in the 
alternative, was not the least restrictive means of achieving those 
interests.  For the harm factor, the court ruled that both Planned 
Parenthood and its patients would suffer sufficient harm to support 
the requested relief.  Rounding out its analysis, the court found no 
 
- 8 - 
adequate remedy at law and that an injunction would serve the 
public interests. 
 
The State appealed to the First District, triggering an 
automatic stay of the temporary injunction.5  Planned Parenthood 
asked the trial court and later the district court to vacate the 
automatic stay.  Both courts, however, denied relief.  State v. 
Planned Parenthood of Sw. & Cent. Fla., 342 So. 3d 863, 865-66 
(Fla. 1st DCA 2022).  As relevant here, in denying Planned 
Parenthood’s motion to vacate, a divided panel of the First District 
held that Planned Parenthood could not establish irreparable harm 
as a result of the stay.  Id. at 868-69.  A few weeks later, the district 
court relied on essentially that same reasoning in reversing the 
temporary injunction—again, one judge dissented.  State v. Planned 
Parenthood of Sw. & Cent. Fla., 344 So. 3d 637, 638 (Fla. 1st DCA 
2022) (“[T]he non-final order granting the temporary injunction is 
reversed as [Planned Parenthood] could not assert irreparable harm 
on behalf of persons not appearing below.”); id. (Kelsey, J., 
dissenting). 
 
5.  Fla. R. App. P. 9.310(b)(2) (automatic-stay provision 
triggered by filing of timely notice of appeal in certain situations). 
 
- 9 - 
Following these adverse rulings, Planned Parenthood asked us 
to review the First District’s decisions, arguing that they conflict 
with our precedent.  Accepting this jurisdictional argument, we 
granted review. 
II 
Planned Parenthood asks that we quash the district court’s 
decisions and reinstate the temporary injunction.  Relying on our 
precedent, it argues that the right to an abortion is secured by our 
constitution’s Privacy Clause.  The State disputes Planned 
Parenthood’s interpretation of the provision’s text and asks us to 
reconsider our Privacy Clause jurisprudence or, at the very least, 
the abortion-related decisions.6  It argues that T.W.—our first case 
recognizing a right to abortion under the Privacy Clause—is flawed 
 
6.  In its brief, the State argues that Planned Parenthood lacks 
standing to challenge the new law.  However, at oral argument, the 
Solicitor General urged us to decide this case on the merits.  Oral 
Arg. at 50:52-51:06 (“We do think that the Court can assume for 
the sake of argument that the Plaintiffs have standing here and 
instead reach the merits. . . .  That, I think, is what the Court 
should do.”).  We view these statements as an abandonment of the 
State’s standing argument.  Thus, we proceed directly to the merits 
without passing upon any theory of standing articulated by the 
parties. 
 
 
- 10 - 
in numerous respects, including that it failed to meaningfully 
consider the actual text of the provision at issue, failed to consider 
the history of the provision, and failed to give deference to the 
statute challenged in that case.  Mindful of these fundamental 
concerns, we agree that our holding in T.W. should be re-
examined.7 
In T.W., this Court assessed a Privacy Clause challenge to a 
law that required unmarried minors to obtain parental consent or a 
substitute for consent to have an abortion.  We held the challenged 
law to be incompatible with the protections afforded by the Privacy 
Clause, concluding that the right to abortion was embodied within 
the provision.  T.W., 551 So. 2d at 1188, 1192-96; id. at 1197, 1201 
 
7.  As our discussion will show, we also emphasize the 
uniqueness of the competing interests implicated in abortion and 
the fact that the Supreme Court repudiated Roe and its underlying 
understanding of privacy.  Because these factors relate to T.W. in a 
particularized way, we do not take up the State’s invitation now to 
revisit the question of whether the Privacy Clause protects only 
“informational privacy” interests.  Our jurisprudence before and 
after T.W. has understood the Privacy Clause to encompass certain 
decisional or autonomy rights, and today we do not revisit our 
precedents outside the abortion context. 
 
 
- 11 - 
(Ehrlich, C.J., concurring specially).8  In the majority opinion, we 
discussed Roe v. Wade at length and ultimately adopted its 
definition of privacy along with its trimester and viability rules.  
See id. at 1190-94.  Integral to the majority’s analysis, T.W. 
emphasized recent Florida cases (primarily from the district courts) 
equating privacy with the right of personal decision-making in the 
specific context of refusing unwanted medical treatment.  Id. at 
1192.  We also relied on Winfield v. Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering, 
477 So. 2d 544 (Fla. 1985)—a case involving privacy in financial 
institution records—to conclude that the provision “embraces more 
privacy interests” and “extends more protection to the individual in 
those interests, than does the federal Constitution.”  T.W., 551 So. 
2d at 1192. 
Building on that, this Court made the following broad 
pronouncement: 
 
8.  Three justices, however, concluded that the challenged 
statute could be given a constitutional construction, though they 
accepted or assumed that the Privacy Clause conferred a right to 
abortion.  T.W., 551 So. 2d at 1201-02 (Overton, J., concurring in 
part and dissenting in part); id. at 1202-04 (Grimes, J., concurring 
in part and dissenting in part); id. at 1204-05 (McDonald, J., 
dissenting). 
 
- 12 - 
Florida’s privacy provision is clearly implicated in a 
woman’s decision of whether or not to continue her 
pregnancy.  We can conceive of few more personal or 
private decisions concerning one’s body that one can 
make in the course of a lifetime, except perhaps the 
decision of the terminally ill in their choice of whether to 
discontinue necessary medical treatment. 
Of all decisions a person makes about his or 
her body, the most profound and intimate 
relate to two sets of ultimate questions: first, 
whether, when, and how one’s body is to 
become the vehicle for another human being’s 
creation; second, when and how—this time 
there is no question of “whether”—one’s body 
is to terminate its organic life. 
[Laurence H.] Tribe, American Constitutional Law 1337-
38 (2d ed. 1988).  The decision whether to obtain an 
abortion is fraught with specific physical, psychological, 
and economic implications of a uniquely personal nature 
for each woman.  See Roe, 410 U.S. at 153.  The Florida 
Constitution embodies the principle that “[f]ew decisions 
are more personal and intimate, more properly private, or 
more basic to individual dignity and autonomy, than a 
woman’s decision . . . whether to end her pregnancy.  A 
woman’s right to make that choice freely is fundamental.” 
 
T.W., 551 So. 2d at 1192-93 (second alteration in original) (some 
citations omitted). 
This pronouncement was flawed in several respects.  T.W. 
associated the language of the Privacy Clause with Roe’s 
understanding of privacy; but it did not justify how that concept of 
privacy aligned with our constitution’s text—i.e., “the right to be let 
alone and free from government intrusion into private life.”  T.W. 
 
- 13 - 
also did not ask how Florida voters would have understood the text 
of the provision and how that understanding would be informed by 
Florida’s long history of proscribing abortion.  As a result of its 
analytical path, T.W. did not look to dictionaries, contextual clues, 
or historical sources bearing on the text’s meaning.  Instead, 
overlooking all these probative sources, it adopted Roe’s notions of 
privacy and its trimester framework as matters of Florida 
constitutional law.9  Compounding these errors, the T.W. majority 
failed to apply longstanding principles of judicial deference to 
legislative enactments and failed to analyze whether the statute 
should be given the benefit of a presumption of constitutionality. 
Since Roe featured prominently in T.W., we think it fair to also 
point out that the T.W. majority did not examine or offer a reasoned 
response to the existing criticism of that decision or consider 
 
9.  In his dissent, Justice Labarga emphasizes “that T.W. was 
decided on state law grounds.”  Dissenting op. at 90.  We agree that 
T.W. was not applying federal law to the challenged statute.  
However, T.W. relied heavily on Roe in interpreting the meaning of 
our constitution’s Privacy Clause.  Indeed, T.W. cited Roe over 
twenty times, it accepted Roe’s concept of privacy without analysis, 
and it enacted a viability-trimester system that closely paralleled 
Roe’s, without citing to any Florida precedent supporting that 
framework. 
 
- 14 - 
whether it was doctrinally coherent.  This was a significant misstep 
because Roe did not provide a settled definition of privacy rights.  
Controversial from the moment it was released, “Roe’s 
constitutional analysis was far outside the bounds of any 
reasonable interpretation of the various constitutional provisions to 
which it vaguely pointed.”  Dobbs, 597 U.S. at 268.  What’s more, 
Roe “failed to ground its decision in text, history, or precedent.”  Id. 
at 270.  This left even progressive legal scholars baffled at how such 
a right could be gleaned from the constitution’s text.  Akhil R. 
Amar, Intratextualism, 112 Harv. L. Rev. 747, 778 (1999) (“As a 
precedent-follower, Roe simply stringcites a series of privacy cases 
involving marriage, procreation, contraception, bedroom reading, 
education, and other assorted topics, and then abruptly announces 
with no doctrinal analysis that this privacy right ‘is broad enough to 
encompass’ abortion. . . .  But as the Court itself admits a few 
pages later [in the opinion], the existence of the living fetus makes 
the case at hand ‘inherently different’ . . . from every single one of 
these earlier-invoked cases.  And as a precedent-setter, the Court 
creates an elaborate trimester framework that has struck many 
critics as visibly (indeed, nakedly) . . . more legislative than 
 
- 15 - 
judicial.” (footnotes omitted)); see also Laurence H. Tribe, Foreword: 
Toward a Model of Roles in the Due Process of Life and Law, 87 
Harv. L. Rev. 1, 4 (1973) (noting that “[o]ne reads the Court’s 
explanation [of the viability line] several times before becoming 
convinced that nothing has inadvertently been omitted”). 
Indeed, just three years after T.W. (and well before Dobbs), the 
U.S. Supreme Court abandoned Roe’s position that the right to 
abortion was grounded in any sort of privacy right.  See Casey, 505 
U.S. at 846 (joint opinion) (“Constitutional protection of the 
woman’s decision to terminate her pregnancy derives from the Due 
Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.”); cf. Dobbs, 597 
U.S. at 279 (“The Court [in Casey] abandoned any reliance on a 
privacy right and instead grounded the abortion right entirely on 
the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause.”).  This 
demonstrates the tenuous connection between “privacy” and 
abortion—an issue that, unlike other privacy matters, directly 
implicates the interests of both developing human life and the 
pregnant woman. 
In light of T.W.’s analytical deficiencies and subsequent U.S. 
Supreme Court decisions rejecting the Roe framework on which 
 
- 16 - 
T.W.’s reasoning depended, our assessment of the challenged 
statute requires us to examine the Privacy Clause and, for the first 
time in the abortion context, consider the original public meaning of 
the text as it was understood by Florida voters in 1980.10 
 
 III 
A 
We begin by recognizing the standard that governs our review.  
Because this case requires us to review both “the constitutionality 
of a statute and the interpretation of a provision of the Florida 
Constitution,” our review is de novo.  Lewis v. Leon Cnty., 73 So. 3d 
151, 153 (Fla. 2011) (citing Crist v. Fla. Ass’n of Crim. Def. Laws., 
Inc., 978 So. 2d 134, 139 (Fla. 2008)); see also Florigrown, LLC, 317 
So. 3d at 1110. 
We have long recognized that “statutes come clothed with a 
presumption of constitutionality and must be construed whenever 
possible to effect a constitutional outcome.”  Lewis, 73 So. 3d at 
 
10.  We decided two other significant cases involving abortion 
after T.W., but in those cases, we did not provide additional 
doctrinal justifications for T.W.’s adoption of Roe’s privacy 
framework. 
 
- 17 - 
153 (citing Fla. Dep’t of Revenue v. City of Gainesville, 918 So. 2d 
250, 256 (Fla. 2005)).  Indeed, nearly a century ago, we said:  
(1) On its face every act of the Legislature is presumed to 
be constitutional; (2) every doubt as to its 
constitutionality must be resolved in its favor; [and] (3) if 
the act admits of two interpretations, one of which would 
lead to its constitutionality and the other to its 
unconstitutionality, the former rather than the latter 
must be adopted . . . . 
 
Gray v. Cent. Fla. Lumber Co., 140 So. 320, 323 (Fla. 1932); see also 
Savage v. Bd. of Pub. Instruction for Hillsborough Cnty., 133 So. 341, 
344 (Fla. 1931); Chatlos v. Overstreet, 124 So. 2d 1, 2 (Fla. 1960); In 
re Caldwell’s Estate, 247 So. 2d 1, 3 (Fla. 1971); Franklin v. State, 
887 So. 2d 1063, 1073 (Fla. 2004); Florigrown, LLC, 317 So. 3d at 
1111; Statler v. State, 349 So. 3d 873, 884 (Fla. 2022).  And to 
overcome the presumption of constitutionality, “the invalidity must 
appear beyond reasonable doubt.”  Franklin, 887 So. 2d at 1073 
(quoting State ex rel. Flink v. Canova, 94 So. 2d 181, 184 (Fla. 
1957)); see also Waybright v. Duval Cnty., 196 So. 430, 432 (Fla. 
1940) (“[W]e will . . . determine if, beyond a reasonable doubt, 
violence was done [to] any provisions of the organic law in the 
passage of the challenged act, and in doing so will not deal with the 
 
- 18 - 
merits of the measure, that being the exclusive concern of the 
Legislature.”). 
B 
Our approach to interpreting the constitution reflects a 
commitment to the supremacy-of-text principle, “recognizing that 
‘[t]he words of a governing text are of paramount concern, and what 
they convey, in their context, is what the text means.’ ”  Coates v. 
R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 365 So. 3d 353, 354 (Fla. 2023) 
(alteration in original) (quoting Levy v. Levy, 326 So. 3d 678, 681 
(Fla. 2021)) (interpreting statutory text); see also Advisory Op. to 
Governor re Implementation of Amend. 4, The Voting Restoration 
Amend. (Amendment 4), 288 So. 3d 1070, 1081 (Fla. 2020) 
(interpreting constitutional text).  The goal of this approach is to 
ascertain the original, public meaning of a constitutional 
provision—in other words, the meaning as understood by its 
ratifiers at the time of its adoption.  See City of Tallahassee v. Fla. 
Police Benevolent Ass’n, Inc., 375 So. 3d 178, 183 (Fla. 2023) (“[W]e 
give the words of the constitution their plain, usual, ordinary, and 
commonly accepted meanings at the time they were written.”).  In 
construing the meaning of a constitutional provision, we do not 
 
- 19 - 
seek the original intent of the voters or the framers.  Instead, we 
ask how the public would have understood the meaning of the text 
in its full context when the voters ratified it.  See Amendment 4, 288 
So. 3d at 1081-82. 
To answer this question of public meaning, we consider the 
text, see Alachua Cnty. v. Watson, 333 So. 3d 162, 169-70 (Fla. 
2022), contextual clues, see id., dictionaries, see Somers v. United 
States, 355 So. 3d 887, 891 (Fla. 2022), canons of construction, 
see Conage v. United States, 346 So. 3d 594, 598-99 (Fla. 2022), 
and historical sources, including evidence related to public 
discussion, see Tomlinson v. State, 369 So. 3d 1142, 1147-51 (Fla. 
2023); Dist. of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 614 (2008). 
IV 
With these background principles fixed, we now focus our 
attention on the Privacy Clause itself.  Article I, section 23 is 
entitled: “Right of privacy.”  Our constitution, though, tells us that 
in construing the meaning of constitutional text, we are not to use 
titles and subtitles.  See art. X, § 12(h), Fla. Const.  Accordingly, we 
look at the operative text, which guarantees the right “to be let 
 
- 20 - 
alone and free from governmental intrusion into the person’s private 
life.”  Art. I, § 23. 
As is apparent at first glance, the provision does not explicitly 
reference abortion at all.  Thus, if Planned Parenthood is to prevail, 
we must find that the public would have understood the principle 
embodied in the operative text to encompass abortion, even though 
the clause itself says nothing about it. 
To this end, the parties have marshaled era-appropriate 
dictionary definitions of key terms in the Privacy Clause.  Based on 
the dictionaries we consulted, we know that in 1980 the right to be 
“let alone” could be defined as the right to be left “in solitude,” free 
from outside “interfer[ence]” or “attention.”  See Let Alone, Oxford 
English Dictionary 213 (1st ed. 1933) (reprinted in 1978).  And the 
latter phrase—“free from governmental intrusion” into “private 
life”—can convey a similar meaning.  “Intrusion” meant “[i]llegal 
entry upon or appropriation.”  Intrusion, American Heritage 
Dictionary of the English Language 688 (1st ed. 1969); see also 
Intrusion, American Heritage Dictionary 674 (2d Coll. ed. 1982) 
(same); Intrude, American Heritage Dictionary of the English 
Language 687 (1st ed. 1969) (“To interpose (oneself or something) 
 
- 21 - 
without invitation, fitness, or leave.”); Intrude, American Heritage 
Dictionary 674 (2d Coll. ed. 1982) (similar).  And the word “private” 
carried the idea of being “[s]ecluded from the sight, presence, or 
intrusion of others,” the chief example being “a private bathroom.”  
Private, American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language 1042 
(1st ed. 1969); Private, American Heritage Dictionary 986 (2d Coll. 
ed. 1982) (same). 
These accepted definitions do not seem to us to be natural 
ways of describing the abortion procedures of 1980.  The decision to 
have an abortion may have been made in solitude, but the 
procedure itself included medical intervention and required both 
the presence and intrusion of others.  See, e.g., Roe, 410 U.S. at 
172 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting) (“A transaction resulting in an 
operation such as [abortion] is not ‘private’ in the ordinary usage of 
that word.”); Thornburgh v. Am. Coll. of Obstetricians & 
Gynecologists, 476 U.S. 747, 792 (1986) (White, J., dissenting) 
(noting that even the Roe majority recognized a “pregnant woman 
cannot be isolated in her privacy” because “the termination of a 
 
- 22 - 
pregnancy typically involves the destruction of another entity: the 
fetus” (quoting Roe, 410 U.S. at 159)).11 
Next, we see if contextual clues could offer guidance.  Looking 
at the complete text of the provision allows us to consider the 
physical and logical relation of its parts, as they might have been 
viewed by a voter.  See Lab’y Corp. of Am. v. Davis, 339 So. 3d 318, 
324 (Fla. 2022).  
 
11.  The dissent cites Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 
(1965) (invalidating on privacy grounds a state law criminalizing the 
use of contraception in the marital context), to support the 
assertion that the involvement of others does not prevent an activity 
or procedure from being a private matter.  Dissenting op. at 67-68 
(stressing that the law at issue in Griswold “operate[d] directly on 
an intimate relation of husband and wife and their physician’s role 
in one aspect of that relation” (quoting Griswold, 381 U.S. at 482)).  
But the Court in Griswold “only invalidated the section of the state 
law which prohibited the use of contraception, rather than 
outlawing the manufacture, distribution, or sale of contraceptives.”  
Alyson M. Cox & O. Carter Snead, “Grievously and Egregiously 
Wrong”: American Abortion Jurisprudence, 26 Tex. Rev. L. & Pol. 1, 
16-17 (2022).  Indeed, as we noted above, Roe itself acknowledged 
that abortion was “inherently different” from the situations involved 
in cases like Griswold.  Roe, 410 U.S. at 159.  Thus, we do not 
share the dissent’s concern “that parties will rely on the majority’s 
reasoning—that the involvement of ‘others’ in an abortion procedure 
defeats privacy—in attempts to undermine the broad privacy 
protections that are extended in the medical context.”  Dissenting 
op. at 68. 
 
 
- 23 - 
The first sentence sets forth the protected right, i.e., “to be let 
alone and free from governmental intrusion into . . . private 
life.”  The second sentence then provides that “[t]his section shall 
not be construed to limit the public’s right of access to public 
records and meetings as provided by law.”  Art. I, § 23.  By its 
terms, this latter sentence covers “public records and meetings.”  
That phrase—which relates only to accessing public information—
does not implicate or apply to the subject of abortion.  We do not 
give great weight to this observation, but we note it here to 
emphasize that contextual clues do not lend support to a claim that 
voters clearly understood abortion to be part and parcel of the 
rights recognized in the Privacy Clause. 
V 
Dictionary definitions and immediate context, although 
informative, do not provide a full picture of the text’s meaning.  We 
also consider the historical background of the phrases contained 
within the operative text.  See Tomlinson, 369 So. 3d at 1146 
(“[W]hen (as often happens) a word had more than one accepted 
meaning at that time, we decide which one is the law by looking to 
the context in which it appears, and what history tells us about 
 
- 24 - 
how it got there.”); Antonin Scalia & Bryan Garner, Reading Law: 
The Interpretation of Legal Texts 33 (2012) (“[C]ontext embraces not 
just textual purpose but also . . . a word’s historical associations 
acquired from recurrent patterns of past usage . . . .”); see also 
Heller, 554 U.S. at 605 (noting the critical importance in 
constitutional interpretation of examining “a variety of legal and 
other sources to determine the public understanding of a legal text 
in the period after its enactment or ratification”); TransUnion LLC v. 
Ramirez, 594 U.S. 413, 424 (2021) (relying on historical sources in 
determining constitutional text’s meaning); N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol 
Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1, 26-27 (2022) (historical sources 
integral to Court’s holding). 
A 
Before examining the Privacy Clause’s specific history and 
public debate, we explore the settled use of the “right to be let 
alone” in the context of Florida law, cognizant that technical 
meanings might bear upon the public understanding of the 
constitutional text.12 
 
12.  In construing constitutional provisions that have an 
acquired meaning, “[w]e cannot understand these provisions unless 
 
- 25 - 
The phrase “to be let alone” carries with it a rich legal 
tradition.  In Cason v. Baskin, we discussed the common-law right 
to privacy and explained that in substance it was “the right to be let 
alone, the right to live in a community without being held up to the 
public gaze if you don’t want to be held up to the public gaze.”  20 
So. 2d 243, 248 (Fla. 1944) (quoting Laurence H. Eldredge, Modern 
Tort Problems 77 (1941)).13  This right “to be let alone,” which was 
 
we understand their history; and when we find them expressed in 
technical words, and words of art, we must suppose these words to 
be employed in their technical sense.”  Thomas M. Cooley, A 
Treatise on the Constitutional Limitations which Rest upon the 
Legislative Power of the States of the American Union 93-94 (7th ed. 
1903).  Indeed, “[t]he technical sense in these cases is the sense 
popularly understood, because that is the sense fixed upon the 
words in legal and constitutional history where they have been 
employed for the protection of popular rights.”  Id. at 94 (emphasis 
added). 
 
13.  We recognize that this phrase “the right to be let alone” is 
likely sourced from the seminal 1890 law-review article, The Right to 
Privacy.  Samuel D. Warren & Louis D. Brandeis, The Right to 
Privacy, 4 Harv. L. Rev. 193 (1890); cf. Stall v. State, 570 So. 2d 
257, 265 (Fla. 1990) (Kogan, J., dissenting) (recognizing significance 
of this article).  The authors of that article elaborated on the “right 
to be let alone” and free from “intrusion upon the domestic circle.”  
Warren & Brandeis, supra, at 195-96 (borrowing label for this right 
from a tort treatise by Judge Thomas Cooley).  The right, however, 
“had little to do with the autonomy of an individual to make 
decisions . . . free from government control.”  Jeffrey M. Shaman, 
The Right of Privacy in State Constitutional Law, 37 Rutgers L.J. 
971, 990 (2006).  It described a “different sort of privacy”—one 
 
- 26 - 
often used interchangeably with the “right to privacy,” was a 
prominent feature in Florida tort law.  See, e.g., Battaglia v. Adams, 
164 So. 2d 195, 197 (Fla. 1964) (“An unauthorized use of a person’s 
name in this respect is recognized as a violation of his right of 
privacy.”); Jacova v. S. Radio & Television Co., 83 So. 2d 34, 36 (Fla. 
1955) (reiterating that Florida recognized a common-law claim for 
invasion of privacy and noting that “[when] one, whether willingly or 
not, becomes an actor in an occurrence of public or general 
interest,” “he emerges from his seclusion, and it is not an invasion 
of his ‘right of privacy’ to publish his photograph with an account of 
such occurrence” (quoting Metter v. L.A. Exam’r, 95 P.2d 491, 494 
(Cal. Ct. App. 1939))); Harms v. Mia. Daily News, Inc., 127 So. 2d 
715, 717 (Fla. 3d DCA 1961) (noting in the tort context that “[t]he 
 
“directed to keeping personal information from being exposed to the 
public, rather than to keeping decision-making within the control of 
an individual.”  Id.  To Warren and Brandeis, the “right to be let 
alone” and free from “intrusion” safe-guarded against the 
publication of private facts.  Warren & Brandeis, supra, at 195-96, 
207-12. 
 
 
- 27 - 
right of privacy is defined as the right of an individual to be let 
alone and to live a life free from unwarranted publicity”).14 
Significantly, throughout the decades in which the “right to be 
let alone” was developed and applied in Florida, two distinct 
propositions were true in the law and harmonious: first, the right 
“to be let alone” existed and had a discernable and enforceable 
meaning; and second, the Legislature had the authority to 
comprehensively regulate abortion before and after viability.  
Indeed, from at least 1868 to 1972, abortion was for the most part 
prohibited in our state.15  And although litigants, prior to the 
 
14.  Florida law in this respect appears consistent with that of 
other jurisdictions.  See W.E. Shipley, Annotation, Right of Privacy, 
14 A.L.R.2d 750 (1950) (noting acts of intrusion into one’s private 
affairs may also constitute violations of the right of privacy, such as 
eavesdropping, examination of private records or papers, or 
publications of personal material identified with the complainant as 
would using the complainant’s name or likeness in almost any form 
of distributive publication). 
 
15.  See ch. 1637, subc. 3, § 11, subc. 8, § 9, Laws of Fla. 
(1868) (outlawing most abortions); Rev. St. 1892, §§ 2387, 2618 
(same); §§ 782.10, 797.01, Fla. Stat. (1941) (repealed 1972) (same); 
§§ 782.10, 797.01, Fla. Stat. (1971) (repealed 1972) (same).  In 
1972, this Court determined that the abortion statute in effect at 
that time was unconstitutionally vague.  State v. Barquet, 262 So. 
2d 431, 438 (Fla. 1972).  Immediately following that decision, the 
Legislature passed a more specific law, still banning abortion at all 
times during pregnancy except in certain limited circumstances.  
 
- 28 - 
adoption of the Privacy Clause, sought to curtail government action 
by arguing they had the “right to be let alone,” we are not aware of 
litigants invoking that particular right to challenge abortion 
restrictions in Florida. 
We also stress that this “right to be let alone” was modified by 
a limiting principle: the right did not permit an individual to inflict 
harm on herself or others.  See State v. Eitel, 227 So. 2d 489, 491 
(Fla. 1969) (rejecting a challenge to helmet laws based on a right “to 
be let alone,” stressing that “no person is an entirely isolated being” 
and that “it is impossible for a person to do anything seriously or 
permanently hurtful to himself, without mischief reaching at least 
to his near connections, and often far beyond them”) (cleaned up).  
Indeed, our Privacy Clause jurisprudence outside the abortion 
context recognizes that the right does not authorize harm to third 
parties.  See, e.g., Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So. 2d 1271, 1276 (Fla. 
1996) (parents’ privacy right to raise their children yields to need to 
protect children from harm).  Because the “right to be let alone” was 
limited in this way, it is not surprising that when litigants 
 
Ch. 72-196, § 2, Laws of Fla. (codified at section 458.22 of the 
Florida Statutes (Supp. 1972)) (repealed 1976). 
 
- 29 - 
challenged the 1972 abortion statute in this Court, they did not do 
so based on the “right to be let alone.”  Instead, they argued a right 
to privacy grounded in substantive due process under the 
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.  
See Barquet, 262 So. 2d at 434. 
B 
We also acknowledge that the public understanding of the 
term “privacy” was, to some extent, informed by the U.S. Supreme 
Court’s 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade.  Following that decision, the 
phrase “right to privacy” gained new connotations that, for the first 
time, included the choice to have an abortion.  See Roe, 410 U.S. at 
154 (“We, therefore, conclude that the right of personal privacy 
includes the abortion decision . . . .”).  In Planned Parenthood’s 
view, this aspect of federal privacy jurisprudence should control our 
analysis here.  Specifically, Planned Parenthood argues that Florida 
voters would have internalized Roe’s definition of privacy when they 
voted for the privacy amendment.  Indeed, Planned Parenthood has 
repeatedly asserted that the public understanding of this privacy 
definition was so engrained by 1980 that even without a specific 
mention of the term abortion, the Privacy Clause unequivocally 
 
- 30 - 
included such a right by implication.  Agreeing with this argument, 
the dissent cites case law, newspaper articles, a news clip, and 
more to support the contention that Americans, and Floridians in 
particular, would have naturally understood privacy to encompass 
abortion.16 
Though this argument has some force, we cannot agree with 
Planned Parenthood or the dissent that the backdrop of Roe 
conclusively establishes how a voter would have understood the 
provision.  In Roe, the Supreme Court did not consider language 
comparable to the operative text of Florida’s Privacy Clause—that is, 
the “right to be let alone.”  That phrase is found only once in Roe, 
and that single mention is in Justice Stewart’s concurrence quoting 
Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967), in support of the 
proposition that there is no federal right to privacy.  Roe, 410 U.S. 
 
16.  This evidence consists primarily of media coverage 
surrounding the Roe decision and subsequent evidence that 
discussed the abortion debate and associated a right of privacy with 
abortion.  We accept that Roe had some bearing on the public’s 
understanding of privacy rights in 1980.  But, unlike the dissent, 
we do not find that it is dispositive.  We are unwilling to disregard 
other probative evidence of public meaning, much of which is 
focused specifically on the amendment itself.  The dissent, in our 
view, gives little attention to such evidence. 
 
- 31 - 
at 167 n.2 (Stewart, J., concurring).  So, while the Roe majority may 
have deemed abortion to be part of a “right to privacy,” it would 
require an analytical leap to say that the public would have 
instinctively associated “the right to be let alone and free from 
governmental interference into one’s private life” with abortion.  
E.g., Louis Henkin, Privacy and Autonomy, 74 Colum. L. Rev. 1410, 
1424 (1974) (decisional autonomy “is not at all what most people 
mean by privacy,” which instead concerns “my freedom from official 
intrusion into my home, my person, my papers, my telephone”).  
This point is reinforced by the fact that the specific phrase used in 
the Privacy Clause had a consistent meaning in Florida law and had 
never once been interpreted to cover abortion rights. 
And as a final point here, we reiterate that Roe did not settle 
the scope of privacy rights as Planned Parenthood insists.  As we 
discussed earlier, Roe’s privacy-based reasoning was questioned 
soon after the opinion issued and was eventually rejected in a 
decision that completely detached abortion rights from the concept 
of privacy.  See Casey, 505 U.S. at 846 (joint opinion).  Thus, even if 
it is possible that voters would have understood the Privacy Clause 
to protect certain individual autonomy interests, it is by no means 
 
- 32 - 
clear that those interests would have included the controversial 
subject of abortion, which uniquely involves the interests of 
prenatal life.  Consequently, while Roe is relevant to our analysis of 
public meaning, it is not dispositive. 
Having considered dictionary definitions, context, and 
technical meanings that could have informed the original public 
meaning, we now turn to a critical piece of our historical analysis 
where we answer the following relevant questions: How did this 
provision make its way to the ballot, what was the focus of the 
debate surrounding its adoption, and how were the issues framed 
for the voters? 
C 
The origin of our Privacy Clause traces back to the work of a 
constitution revision commission in the late 1970s.  As part of its 
work, the commission held public meetings throughout Florida and 
listened to the public’s views and concerns.  See Daniel R. Gordon, 
Upside Down Intentions: Weakening the State Constitutional Right to 
Privacy, a Florida Story of Intrigue and a Lack of Historical Integrity, 
71 Temp. L. Rev. 579, 588 (1998); Transcript of Fla. C.R.C. 
proceedings at D:003272-73 (Jan. 9, 1978) (discussion of 
 
- 33 - 
committee’s work regarding privacy proposal).  Eventually, the 
commission agreed upon the following language: 
Every natural person has the right to be let alone and 
free from governmental intrusion into his private life 
except as otherwise provided herein. 
 
Patricia A. Dore, Of Rights Lost and Gained, 6 Fla. St. U. L. Rev. 
609, 650 n.248 (1978) (quoting Fla. C.R.C., Rev. Fla. Const. art. I, 
§ 23 (May 11, 1978)). 
That proposed amendment, along with roughly 80 others, was 
submitted to the public as a package deal in the 1978 election.  
Gordon, supra, at 588.  This package, in addition to containing the 
privacy proposal, also included amendments ensuring access to (1) 
public records, (2) meetings of non-judicial public bodies, (3) 
judicial hearings and records, and (4) proceedings and records of 
the judicial nominating commissions.  Gerald B. Cope, Jr., To Be 
Let Alone: Florida’s Proposed Right of Privacy, 6 Fla. St. U. L. Rev. 
671, 675-77 (1978).  Of note, proposals specifically addressing state 
abortion rights were rejected by the commissioners and never made 
it to the ballot.  See Fla. Const. Revision Comm’n, Summary of 
Proposed Revisions to the Florida Constitution 1-2 (Sept. 27, 1977) 
(available in the Florida State University College of Law Research 
 
- 34 - 
Center); cf. Mary Ann Lindley, A New Constitution Takes Shape, 
Palm Beach Post-Times, Apr. 9, 1978, at D1. 
For our purposes, though, we focus on statements made by 
commissioners in describing the reason or need for the proposal.17  
On this subject, Justice Overton said: 
[W]ho, ten years ago, really understood that personal and 
financial data on a substantial part of our population 
could be collected by government or business and held 
for easy distribution by computer operated information 
systems?  There is a public concern about how personal 
information concerning an individual citizen is used, 
whether it be collected by government or by business.  
The subject of individual privacy and privacy law is in a 
developing stage. . . .  It is a new problem that should 
probably be addressed. 
 
Transcript of Fla. C.R.C. proceedings D:000020-21 (July 6, 1977). 
 
17.  See McDonald v. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742, 828-29 
(2010) (Thomas, J., concurring in part and concurring in the 
judgment) (“When interpreting constitutional text, the goal is to 
discern the most likely public understanding of a particular 
provision at the time it was adopted.  Statements by legislators can 
assist in this process to the extent they demonstrate the manner in 
which the public used or understood a particular word or phrase.  
They can further assist to the extent there is evidence that these 
statements were disseminated to the public.  In other words, this 
evidence is useful not because it demonstrates what the draftsmen 
of the text may have been thinking, but only insofar as it 
illuminates what the public understood the words chosen by the 
draftsmen to mean.”). 
 
- 35 - 
Justice Overton was not alone in this respect.  Commissioner 
Jon Moyle (sponsor of the privacy proposal) spoke of government 
surveillance, technological advances, and society’s dependence on 
such technology—characterizing them as threats to an individual’s 
privacy.  Transcript of Fla. C.R.C. proceedings at D:003273, 3276-
78 (Jan. 9, 1978).  He also noted that records about private life were 
becoming more common.  Id. at D:003277-81.  According to him, 
states were “very much involved in the business of keeping records 
about their residents.”  Id. at D:003276.  But the states, in his view, 
had not done “their part” in protecting such records.  Id. at 
D:003277.  In line with Commissioner Moyle’s sentiments, 
Commissioners Lew Brantley and Dexter Douglass both noted 
specific government-surveillance efforts as sources of privacy 
concerns.  Id. at D:003325 (remarks of Lew Brantley); id. at 
D:003336 (remarks of Dexter Douglass). 
This historical survey is illustrative of the commission’s focus 
in terms of privacy.  Various commissioners publicly expressed 
concern for informational privacy.  However, as best as we can tell 
from their statements, that pressing concern did not extend to 
abortion. 
 
- 36 - 
The proposals failed, and less than two years later, we held 
that there was no state constitutional right of privacy that would 
prevent public disclosure of confidential papers prepared by a 
consultant for an electric authority.  Shevin v. Byron, Harless, 
Schaffer, Reid & Assocs., Inc., 379 So. 2d 633, 639 (Fla. 1980); cf. 
Laird v. State, 342 So. 2d 962, 963 (Fla. 1977) (no constitutional 
right of privacy to smoke marijuana in confines of home). 
Months after Shevin was decided, the Legislature revived the 
idea of a privacy clause and ultimately agreed on a proposal that 
said: 
Every natural person has the right to be let alone and 
free from governmental intrusion into [the person’s] 
private life except as otherwise provided herein.  This 
section shall not be construed to limit the public’s right 
of access to public records and meetings as provided by 
law. 
 
Editorial, Guaranteeing Our Privacy, Boca Raton News, Oct. 
29, 1980, at 6A (setting forth language to appear on 1980 
ballot); Patrick McMahon, State Constitutional Amendments, 
St. Petersburg Times, Oct. 30, 1980, at 22 (noting ballot title). 
 
In overwhelming numbers, legislators from both political 
parties voted to approve it for placement on the ballot.  Out of the 
 
- 37 - 
138 legislators who voted on it, only 6 did not support the proposal.  
See Lorraine Cichowski, House Votes to Propose Guaranteeing Right 
to Privacy, Fort Myers News-Press, May 7, 1980, at 8B; Jim Walker, 
Senators Clash over Privacy Amendment, Tampa Tribune, May 15, 
1980, at 6-A.  Of additional note, during the floor debate, there was 
virtually no discussion of abortion.  And when abortion was brought 
up, the Senate sponsor assured other senators that the proposal 
would have no effect on that subject.  Audio Tape: Proceedings of 
the Fla. S., Tape 2 at 17:40 (May 14, 1980) (available at Fla. Dep’t of 
State, Fla. State Archives, Tallahassee, Fla., Series S1238, Box 57). 
 
As best as we can tell, no commissioner or legislator ever 
claimed (at least publicly between 1977-80) that abortion was part 
of the rights guaranteed by the Privacy Clause.18  See, e.g., Gordon, 
 
18.  To the extent that Planned Parenthood relies on 
Representative Jon Mills’s later statement in the 1990s that he 
subjectively hoped that the privacy proposal would cover abortion, 
such reliance is misplaced.  See Heller, 554 U.S. at 577 (proper 
approach to interpretation does not consider hidden or secret 
meaning “that would not have been known to ordinary citizens in 
the founding generation”).  Similarly, Planned Parenthood and one 
amicus misplace reliance on how voters handled two later proposed 
amendments—one in 2004 and the other in 2012.  The 
understanding of voters over 20 years after the privacy amendment 
offers little value in determining what the voters in 1980 would have 
understood the privacy proposal to mean.  Indeed, at oral 
 
- 38 - 
supra, at 590 n.148 (“Nowhere did revision commissioners in 1978 
refer to abortion . . . .”).  Indeed, Planned Parenthood does not claim 
otherwise. 
D 
 
Like the history of the privacy proposal, the public debate 
surrounding the amendment also did not focus on abortion.  Once 
the privacy proposal was approved for placement on the ballot in 
1980, the public engaged in significant and robust debate over 
whether that proposal should be approved. 
Advocates for homosexual rights, proponents of legalized 
marijuana use, and various editorial boards advocated in favor of 
the amendment.  Mary Hladky, Commissioners Table Vote on State 
Privacy Amendment, Fort Lauderdale News, Oct. 1, 1980, at 8B; 
Mary Lavers, Privacy Amendment Advocated by Kunst, Tampa 
Times, Oct. 23, 1980, at 10-A; Associated Press, Privacy 
Amendment Caught in Swirl of Controversy, Sentinel Star (Orlando), 
Oct. 24, 1980, at 2-C; Editorial, Amendment 2—Vote Yes, 
 
argument, Planned Parenthood conceded as much.  See Oral Arg. at 
22:59-23:02 (“2012 isn’t evidence of what [the privacy amendment] 
meant in 1980.”). 
 
- 39 - 
Bradenton Herald, Nov. 1, 1980, at A-4; Craig Matsuda, State 
Questions Are a Mix of Roads, Water, Privacy, Miami Herald, Nov. 2, 
1980, at 8E; Amendments, St. Petersburg Times, Nov. 1, 1980, at 
12B.  These groups presented sweeping views of what the 
amendment would accomplish.  Some, for instance, claimed that 
the amendment would decriminalize marijuana as well as certain 
intimate sexual conduct occurring inside the confines of a home.  
Julius Karash, Psychologist Stumps for Amendment, News-Press 
Local, Oct. 3, 1980, at B1; Steve Piacente, Gay Rights Activist 
Speaks for Privacy Act, Tampa Tribune, Oct. 24, 1980, at 2-B. 
Opponents of the measure included some political 
conservatives, various law enforcement officers, an association of 
prosecutors, and the then-serving governor.  Prosecutors Condemn 
Privacy Amendment, Florida Today, Oct. 28, 1980, at 4B; Attorneys’ 
Group Fights Privacy Amendment, Palm Beach Post, Oct. 28, 1980, 
at B26; Amendments under Attack as Vote Nears, Bradenton Herald, 
Oct. 29, 1980, at B-5; Graham Hit on Privacy, Florida Today, Oct. 
29, 1980, at 6B; Amendment Opposition by Graham Criticized, Palm 
Beach Post, Oct. 29, 1980, at A11; Lawyer Raps Constitution 
Revision Plan, Fort Lauderdale News, Oct. 29, 1980, at 17A; Michael 
 
- 40 - 
Harrell, Advertisement, Fort Lauderdale News, Oct. 29, 1980, at 
16A; Amendments, St. Petersburg Times, Nov. 1, 1980, at 12B.  
Some opponents expressed concern that the open-ended language 
would permit courts to expansively interpret the amendment.  
Sensing that growing concern, House sponsors of the privacy 
proposal weighed in on the public debate.  Taking to the 
newspapers, they reassured the public that concerns about whether 
the amendment would accomplish sweeping policy changes were 
unfounded.  For instance, sponsors said that the proposed 
amendment arose from concerns “about technological advances 
that could enable the government to compile extensive computer 
files on citizens.”  Privacy Amendment Caught in Swirl of 
Controversy, supra, at 2-C; see also Associated Press, Privacy 
Measure Stirs Controversy, Pensacola News-Journal, Nov. 2, 1980, 
at 14C.  Indeed, one sponsor said that the proposal was “necessary 
to ward off a growing government whose curiosity about people’s 
private lives also is increasing.”  R. Michael Anderson, Amendment 
Guaranteeing Right to Privacy Debated, Florida Times-Union 
Jacksonville Journal, Oct. 26, 1980, at B-1.  That same sponsor 
characterized the proposal as “quite conservative,” predicting that 
 
- 41 - 
“Florida judges wouldn’t use it to overturn many existing laws.”  
Privacy Amendment Caught in Swirl of Controversy, supra, at 2-C.  
And the other sponsor called expansive views of the proposed 
amendment “garbage.”  See id. 
Of note, in looking at the extensive discussion surrounding the 
privacy amendment, little to nothing was said about abortion in 
print or in public comment.  The debate—as framed to the public—
overwhelmingly associated the Privacy Clause’s terms with concerns 
related to government surveillance and disclosure of private 
information to the public. 
Consistent with this observation, prolife and prochoice groups 
did not join in the fray.  These groups are not politically bashful—
not now, and not in 1980.  If the public understanding of the 
privacy proposal was that it included a silent—but almost 
unfettered—right to abortion, we would expect such groups to have 
engaged in the robust public debate.  But based on all sources 
brought to our attention, we simply see no evidence of that.  
See James W. Fox, Jr., A Historical and Originalist Defense of 
Abortion in Florida, 75 Rutgers U. L. Rev. 393, 443-44 (2023) 
(acknowledging that these groups were silent on this topic; but 
 
- 42 - 
discounting significance of such fact); cf. Oral Arg. at 13:02-13:39 
(counsel for Planned Parenthood acknowledging that silence in the 
historical record). 
The dissent downplays the significance of this scope-of-debate 
evidence.  Dissenting op. at 86.  Accepting the logic of a law review 
article, the dissent claims that “[a]bortion would only have been 
debated if its coverage within the right to privacy were in dispute or 
were not yet established in law.”  Dissenting op. at 86 (quoting Fox, 
supra, at 442-43).  We, however, cannot agree with this speculation.  
A person’s understanding of the amendment’s purpose would 
certainly inform whether he or she supported the adoption of the 
amendment.  And, critically, it would inform how that person would 
persuade others to adopt their position.  The debate over the 
privacy amendment was vigorous, yet there is virtually no evidence 
that anyone publicly connected the privacy amendment proposal 
with abortion rights.  And as referenced by the dissent, newspapers 
during this same period were still discussing the controversy 
surrounding abortion, so it was far from a settled issue.  Dissenting 
op. at 81-82 (noting that “Florida newspapers” in 1980 “covered 
statements by pro-choice activists and by pro-life activists” 
 
- 43 - 
involving the abortion debate).  We are unwilling to presume, as the 
dissent does, that abortion was so intertwined with the term 
“privacy” and so unquestionably accepted by society that its 
complete absence from the public debate surrounding this 
amendment should be expected. 
 
In sum, the scope of the privacy-proposal debate, both in 
terms of topics and participants, underscores that the public would 
not have understood, or assumed, the language of the Privacy 
Clause to encompass abortion. 
E 
Finally, we consider two additional sources of historical 
evidence, both of which show a contemporaneous understanding 
that the Privacy Clause did not enshrine abortion rights in our 
constitution.  The first is concurrent legislative action.  There were 
several Florida statutes passed between 1978 and 1980 regulating 
or restricting access to abortion in substantial ways.  See ch. 78-
382, §§ 2, 4-10, Laws of Fla. (empowering Department of Health 
and Rehabilitative Services to create rules regulating abortion 
clinics; setting forth licensing requirement and framework; 
prohibiting abortion by unlicensed clinics); ch. 79-302, § 1, Laws of 
 
- 44 - 
Fla. (requiring parental consent for unmarried minors); ch. 80-208, 
§ 1, Laws of Fla. (fetal remains to be disposed of in “sanitary and 
appropriate manner”; establishing crime for violations of this 
standard); ch. 80-413, § 1, Laws of Fla. (additional regulations on 
abortion clinics; imposing standard governing disposal of fetal 
remains); cf. Amicus Brief of Former State Representative John 
Grant at 25-28 (noting concurrent legislation on abortion—
particularly the abortion law passed during the same session as the 
privacy proposal).  Based on this significant body of abortion 
regulation—some of which would be struck down as violative of 
Roe19—it seems unlikely to us that the Legislature in 1980 would 
put to the people a proposal crafted to imperil that recent work. 
The second source of evidence is what legislators of the time 
expressed with respect to adding a right-to-life amendment to the 
U.S. Constitution.  See Fla. S. Comm. on HRS SM 737 (1978) Staff 
Analysis 1 (Fla. May 9, 1978) (available at Fla. Dep’t of State, Fla. 
State Archives, Tallahassee, Fla.); Fla. H.R., H.M. 388, 11th Sess. 
(Fla. 1979) (available at Dep’t of State, Fla. State Archives, 
 
19.  See, e.g., Fla. Women’s Med. Clinic, Inc. v. Smith, 536 F. 
Supp. 1048, 1059 (S.D. Fla. 1982). 
 
- 45 - 
Tallahassee, Fla.); Fla. S., S.M. 118, 11th Sess. (Fla. 1979) 
(available at Fla. Dep’t of State, Fla. State Archives, Tallahassee, 
Fla.).  Of significance here, twenty-seven legislators who voted for 
the privacy proposal had, within the prior two years, openly 
supported the adoption of a federal amendment to “protect unborn 
human[s]” in response to Roe v. Wade.  Compare H.R. Journal, 12th 
Sess., at 318 (Fla. 1980), with H.R. Journal, 11th Sess., at 48 (Fla. 
1979); compare S. Journal, 11th Sess., at 21 (Fla. 1979), with S. 
Journal, 12th Sess., at 313 (Fla. 1980).  To us, it seems quite 
unlikely that so many legislators would have tried to remove 
abortion rights as a matter of federal constitutional law only to 
restrict legislative power on abortion just two years later by way of a 
state constitutional amendment. 
F 
We pause to summarize the textual, contextual, and historical 
evidence we have discussed so far.  The Privacy Clause of the 
Florida Constitution does not mention abortion or include a word or 
phrase that clearly incorporates it.  Era-appropriate dictionary 
definitions and contextual clues suggest that abortion does not 
naturally fit within the rights at issue.  Reliable historical sources, 
 
- 46 - 
like the technical meaning of the terms contained in the provision, 
the origin of the amendment, and the framing of the public debate, 
similarly do not support a conclusion that abortion should be read 
into the provision’s text.  Roe is also relevant to our analysis of the 
public meaning of the Privacy Clause.  But speculation as to Roe’s 
effect on voter understanding does not overcome the combined force 
of the substantial evidence we have examined above.  Thus, we 
cannot conclude that in 1980 a voter would have assumed the text 
encompassed a polarizing definition of privacy that included broad 
protections for abortion. 
VI 
We have established the background legal principles that 
govern our review and analyzed the original public meaning of the 
Privacy Clause as it relates to the subject of abortion.  Now, we 
must address how those considerations apply here—namely, can 
Planned Parenthood demonstrate conflict between the challenged 
statute and the constitutional protections secured by the Privacy 
Clause? 
The statute we review prohibits abortions after 15 weeks of 
pregnancy, subject to certain exceptions.  This statute “come[s] 
 
- 47 - 
clothed with a presumption of constitutionality and must be 
construed” if possible “to effect a constitutional outcome.”  Crist, 
978 So. 2d at 139.  To overcome this presumption, the challenger 
must establish invalidity (or conflict) “beyond reasonable doubt.”  
Id.  Based on our analysis finding no clear right to abortion 
embodied within the Privacy Clause, Planned Parenthood cannot 
overcome the presumption of constitutionality and is unable to 
demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that the 15-week ban is 
unconstitutional.20 
This conclusion brings us into tension with our precedent, 
primarily T.W. in which we derived a right to abortion from the 
Privacy Clause’s text and invalidated a statute on that basis.  551 
So. 2d at 1188; see also N. Fla. Women’s Health, 866 So. 2d at 639 
(reaffirming T.W.); Gainesville Woman Care, 210 So. 3d at 1253-56, 
 
20.  Even if we gave significantly greater weight to Roe’s effect 
on the original public meaning of the Privacy Clause (as urged by 
the dissent) and gave less weight to the other meaningful sources of 
evidence discussed above, we would still be left without a definition 
of privacy and considerable ambiguity as to the breadth of the 
provision.  In that instance, we would reach the same conclusion, 
because a statute is presumed constitutional unless shown to be 
invalid beyond a reasonable doubt.  Franklin, 887 So. 2d at 1073.  
The dissent fails to address what effect, if any, this longstanding 
principle of law should have here. 
 
- 48 - 
1260 (relying on T.W.).  In deciding how to resolve that tension, we 
again emphasize that T.W. failed to acknowledge the longstanding 
principle that statutes are presumed to be constitutional.  This 
error led the Court to read additional rights into the constitution 
based on Roe’s dubious and immediately contested reasoning, 
rather than evaluate what the text of the provision actually said or 
what the people of Florida understood those words to mean.  The 
decision to extend the protections of the Privacy Clause beyond 
what the text could reasonably bear was not ours to make.  As a 
result, we removed substantial authority from the people’s elected 
representatives to regulate abortion—a profoundly unique and 
complicated issue that affects society in many significant ways. 
 
Accordingly, for the reasons given above, we find T.W. to be 
clearly erroneous.  Based on our established test for assessing 
stare-decisis issues, we now ask whether there is a valid reason not 
to recede from T.W.  See State v. Poole, 297 So. 3d 487, 506-07 (Fla. 
2020) (outlining a two-part framework on stare-decisis issues). 
We have said that reliance is a critical consideration.  Id.  But 
as noted by the State, the Supreme Court’s reasoning in Dobbs 
shows why reliance does not justify keeping T.W.  In conducting a 
 
- 49 - 
stare-decisis analysis in that case, the Supreme Court stressed that 
“[t]raditional reliance interests arise ‘where advance planning of 
great precision is most obviously a necessity.’ ”  Dobbs, 597 U.S. at 
287 (first quoting Casey, 505 U.S. at 856 (joint opinion); and then 
citing Payne v. Tennessee, 501 U.S. 808, 828 (1991)).  The Court 
went on to state that “those traditional reliance interests [a]re not 
implicated because getting an abortion is generally ‘unplanned 
activity,’ and ‘reproductive planning could take virtually immediate 
account of any sudden restoration of state authority to ban 
abortions.’ ”  Id. at 288 (quoting Casey, 505 U.S. at 856).  Finally, 
the Court rejected application of a more malleable and undefined 
form of reliance that focused on the relative social and economic 
effects of abortion.  Id. at 288-89.  In its view, this type of reliance 
was irrelevant to a proper stare-decisis framework.  Id. 
We think that this analysis from Dobbs is in keeping with 
Poole.  Indeed, in Poole, we expressed wariness for tests that are 
“malleable and do not lend themselves to objective, consistent, and 
predictable application.”  297 So. 3d at 507 (criticizing North Florida 
Women’s Health’s multi-factor stare-decisis framework).  And in the 
years since Poole issued, we have not employed the more malleable 
 
- 50 - 
form of reliance that Dobbs declined to apply—the same sort of 
societal reliance interests now being advanced by Planned 
Parenthood. 
Apart from arguing reliance, Planned Parenthood does not 
offer any other valid reasons for keeping T.W.  Accordingly, because 
Planned Parenthood has failed to demonstrate a valid reason for 
retaining T.W., we recede from it.  We also recede from Gainesville 
Woman Care and North Florida Women’s Health, which both applied 
T.W.’s flawed reasoning and offered no additional doctrinal 
justification for locating a right to abortion in the Privacy Clause. 
VII 
 
We now return to the specific facts of this case.  Below, the 
trial court granted a temporary injunction, finding that Planned 
Parenthood would likely succeed in its constitutional challenge.  
Our holding, however, displaces the doctrinal justification for the 
trial court’s decision.  Planned Parenthood cannot demonstrate a 
likelihood of success on the merits of its claim, which alleged that 
the newly enacted statute was facially invalid under the Privacy 
Clause of the Florida Constitution.  And since Planned Parenthood 
fails on this prong, it is not entitled to a temporary injunction.  
 
- 51 - 
Although we do not adopt the reasoning of the First District, we 
approve the result it reached below. 
 
It is so ordered. 
MUÑIZ, C.J., and CANADY, COURIEL, and FRANCIS, JJ., concur. 
SASSO, J., concurs with an opinion. 
LABARGA, J., dissents with an opinion. 
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION 
AND, IF FILED, DETERMINED. 
 
SASSO, J., concurring. 
 
I join the majority opinion because it correctly holds that the 
Florida Constitution does not contain a right to elective abortion.  I 
write separately to explain why I believe it is appropriate to reach 
that decision considering the standing arguments raised by the 
State in the lower court proceedings and on appeal and as 
highlighted by Amici in this Court.  In doing so, I will start with 
some observations regarding this Court’s standing jurisprudence.  I 
will then explain why I agree with the majority’s decision to accept 
the State’s waiver of any standing arguments here.  Finally, I will 
explain why I believe, in the proper case, this Court should 
reconsider its standing precedent. 
 
- 52 - 
I. 
Standing is the legal doctrine that defines when a litigant has 
a stake in a controversy sufficient to obtain judicial resolution of 
that controversy.  The doctrine keeps us in our constitutional lane 
by ensuring we do not become “roving commissions assigned to 
pass judgment on the validity of the [State’s] laws.”  See Broadrick 
v. Oklahoma, 413 U.S. 601, 611 (1973). 
At the federal level, standing requirements are derived from 
Article III of the United States Constitution’s Case or Controversy 
Clause.  Constitutional in origin, standing is therefore a 
jurisdictional prerequisite to a plaintiff’s right to sue in federal 
court.  See Indus. Servs. Grp., Inc. v. Dobson, 68 F.4th 155, 167 (4th 
Cir. 2023) (“It is axiomatic that standing is a threshold 
jurisdictional issue that must be determined before a court can 
consider the merits of a case.” (citing Steel Co. v. Citizens for a 
Better Env’t, 523 U.S. 83, 88 (1998))). 
For that reason, federal courts have the ability, and indeed the 
obligation, to address standing sua sponte even if a defendant has 
not raised the issue.  See United States v. Hays, 515 U.S. 737, 742 
(1995) (“[W]e are required to address [standing] even if the courts 
 
- 53 - 
below have not passed on it, and even if the parties fail to raise the 
issue before us.” (first alteration in original) (quoting FW/PBS, Inc. 
v. City of Dallas, 493 U.S. 215, 230-31 (1990))); Cent. States Se. & 
Sw. Areas Health & Welfare Fund v. Merck-Medco Managed Care, 
L.L.C., 433 F.3d 181, 198 (2d Cir. 2005) (“Because the standing 
issue goes to this Court’s subject matter jurisdiction, it can be 
raised sua sponte.”).  Likewise, the question of standing is not 
subject to waiver.  Hays, 515 U.S. at 742. 
At the state level, it is different.  As it relates to standing, the 
Florida Constitution is textually distinct from the Federal 
Constitution because it does not contain an explicit cases and 
controversies clause.  It should go without saying, then, that federal 
law does not control standing requirements in state courts.  See 
ASARCO Inc. v. Kadish, 490 U.S. 605, 617 (1989) (noting that the 
constraints of Article III do not apply to state courts, and 
accordingly state courts are not bound by the limitations of a case 
or controversy).  Even so, this Court has at times reflexively adopted 
federal standing tests without examining whether the Florida 
Constitution demands similar requirements.  See, e.g., State v. J.P., 
907 So. 2d 1101, 1113 n.4 (Fla. 2004) (adopting three-part standing 
 
- 54 - 
test established by the United States Supreme Court in Lujan v. 
Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555 (1992)); Alterra Healthcare Corp. 
v. Est. of Shelley, 827 So. 2d 936, 941 (Fla. 2002) (adopting third-
party standing test recognized by the United States Supreme 
Court). 
We have not done so consistently, though.  At times, we have 
concluded that standing in Florida is less restrictive than at the 
federal level.  For example, in Department of Revenue v. Kuhnlein, 
646 So. 2d 717, 720 (Fla. 1994), we said that the doctrine of 
standing does not exist in Florida “in the rigid sense employed in 
the federal system.”  See also Coal. for Adequacy & Fairness in Sch. 
Funding, Inc. v. Chiles, 680 So. 2d 400, 403 (Fla. 1996) (noting that 
in Florida, unlike the federal system, the doctrine of standing has 
not been rigidly followed).  Consistent with this observation, we 
have sometimes applied state-specific standing rules.  See, e.g., 
Johnson v. State, 78 So. 3d 1305, 1314 (Fla. 2012) (holding a 
litigant has standing if “he or she reasonably expects to be affected 
by the outcome of the proceedings, either directly or indirectly” 
(quoting Hayes v. Guardianship of Thompson, 952 So. 2d 498, 505 
(Fla. 2006))).  Other times we have, either explicitly or implicitly, 
 
- 55 - 
bypassed a standing analysis altogether.  See, e.g., J.P., 907 So. 2d 
at 1113 (“Because the Second District never determined whether 
these juveniles have standing to assert the constitutional rights of 
their parents, we decline to rule on these claims.” (footnote 
omitted)).21 
Our inconsistent approach is especially evident in the context 
of third-party standing.  Traditionally, this Court considered as 
well-settled the rule that one who is not himself denied some 
constitutional right or privilege cannot be heard to raise 
constitutional questions on behalf of some other person who may at 
some future time be affected.  See, e.g., Steele v. Freel, 25 So. 2d 
501, 503 (Fla. 1946).  Eventually, though, we carved out exceptions.  
For example, in Jones v. State, 640 So. 2d 1084 (Fla. 1994), we 
determined that criminal defendants could raise the privacy rights 
 
21.  Despite the inconsistent application of various tests to 
determine whether a party has standing to pursue its claims, our 
standing precedent has been steady in one respect.  We have always 
held that standing can be waived.  See, e.g., Krivanek v. Take Back 
Tampa Pol. Comm., 625 So. 2d 840, 842 (Fla. 1993); Cowart v. City 
of West Palm Beach, 255 So. 2d 673, 675 (Fla. 1971).  However, this 
is somewhat logically inconsistent, because we oftentimes have 
adopted federal standards ostensibly derived from the Federal 
Constitution without adopting the corresponding rule that standing 
is jurisdictional in nature and therefore not subject to waiver. 
 
- 56 - 
of the female minors with whom they had sexual relations because 
the criminal defendants “st[oo]d to lose from the outcome of this 
case and yet they ha[d] no other effective avenue for preserving their 
rights.”  Id. at 1085 (referencing Stall v. State, 570 So. 2d 257 (Fla. 
1990), for “vicarious standing” requirements). 
Later, in Alterra, we applied a federal test to determine when 
parties can sue on behalf of rights belonging to others.  827 So. 2d 
at 941-42.  The test, as laid out in Alterra, goes like this: a litigant 
may bring an action on behalf of a third party if 1) the litigant 
suffered an “injury in fact,” thus giving him or her a “sufficiently 
concrete interest” in the outcome of the issue in dispute; 2) the 
litigant has a close relation to the third party; and 3) there is some 
hindrance to the third party’s ability to protect his or her own 
interests.  Id. (quoting Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S. 400, 410-11 
(1991)).  But we applied this test in Alterra without explicitly 
adopting it as doctrine and without addressing our previous 
application of the Stall standard in Jones. 
Only a year after Alterra was decided, we again backed away 
from applying federal standing tests at all in Allstate Insurance Co. 
v. Kaklamanos, 843 So. 2d 885 (Fla. 2003).  There, we reiterated 
 
- 57 - 
that the doctrine of standing does not exist in Florida “in the rigid 
sense employed in the federal system.”  Id. at 895 (quoting 
Kuhnlein, 646 So. 2d at 720).  This made room for our conclusion 
that an insured could maintain an action against the insurer for 
nonpayment of personal injury protection automotive insurance 
benefits even though the insured had not paid the medical bills in 
question and the medical provider had not instituted legal action 
against the insured for nonpayment.  Id. at 897.  And later, we 
appeared to cabin Alterra to the employment context in Weaver v. 
Myers, 229 So. 3d 1118, 1129 (Fla. 2017).  In that same case, we 
also cited favorably the “vicarious standing” test from Jones, a case 
that preceded Alterra.22  Id. 
 
22.  Our doctrinal inconsistency in third-party standing cases 
is not the only aspect of our standing jurisprudence that has been 
unclear.  For example, as noted above we adopted the three-part 
standing test established by the United States Supreme Court in 
Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, in J.P.  But a few years 
later in Johnson, we stated broadly that “standing ‘requires a 
would-be litigant to demonstrate that he or she reasonably expects 
to be affected by the outcome of the proceedings, either directly or 
indirectly.’ ”  78 So. 3d at 1314 (quoting Hayes, 952 So. 2d at 505).  
We did so without any reference to our previous adoption of the 
Lujan test and over the dissenting justices’ observation that the 
moving party would have met that standing requirement.  And 
although we have, with more consistency, adhered to the Rickman 
v. Whitehurst, 74 So. 205 (Fla. 1917), rule when litigants have 
 
- 58 - 
II. 
With that background in mind, I now return to this case.  It 
serves as a prime example of the challenges our doctrinal 
inconsistencies create for litigants and lower courts. 
In the trial court, the State argued Planned Parenthood lacked 
standing to challenge HB 5 because none of the plaintiffs could 
assert a personal right to privacy—instead, the plaintiffs sought to 
assert the privacy rights of their patients and/or customers.  
Working off the Alterra test, the State then argued Planned 
Parenthood could not meet the requirements for overcoming the 
general bar to third-party standing.  In doing so, though, the State 
conceded that the second prong of the Alterra test (the close 
relationship requirement) was satisfied. 
In response, Planned Parenthood accepted the State’s framing 
of the issue, arguing it could satisfy the Alterra test.  This 
framework carried over to the trial court’s order granting the 
 
challenged government action, we continue to carve out exceptions 
without a textual explanation justifying a new exception.  See, e.g., 
Dep’t of Admin. v. Horne, 269 So. 2d 659 (Fla. 1972) (citing federal 
precedent to carve out exception for “ordinary citizens and 
taxpayers” to pursue constitutional claims in certain circumstances 
even absent a showing of special injury to themselves). 
 
- 59 - 
temporary injunction, where it applied the Alterra test and 
concluded that Planned Parenthood has “third-party standing to 
bring this suit on behalf of their actual and potential patients.”  
Planned Parenthood of Sw. & Cent. Fla. v. State, No. 2022-CA-912, 
2022 WL 2436704, at *17 (Fla. 2d Cir. Ct. July 5, 2022).  But, in 
the First District, the court concluded that it did not need to 
address Petitioners’ standing argument.  Instead, the First District 
decided that Petitioners had not suffered irreparable harm sufficient 
to support the issuance of a temporary injunction.  State v. Planned 
Parenthood of Sw. & Cent. Fla., 342 So. 3d 863, 867-68 (Fla. 1st 
DCA 2022). 
That takes us to the parties’ briefing filed in this Court.  The 
State reasserted its argument as to Planned Parenthood’s standing 
to pursue its claims.  But as the majority opinion notes, the State 
essentially conceded the issue of standing at oral argument, urging 
this Court to reach the merits. 
So why do we accept that concession?  First, as the majority 
notes, this case has been litigated under the umbrella of this 
Court’s abortion jurisprudence.  See, e.g., Gainesville Woman Care, 
LLC v. State, 210 So. 3d 1243, 1253-54 (Fla. 2017); N. Fla. Women’s 
 
- 60 - 
Health & Counseling Servs., Inc. v. State, 866 So. 2d 612, 620 (Fla. 
2003); In re T.W., 551 So. 2d 1186, 1188-89 (Fla. 1989).  And our 
abortion jurisprudence falls into the category of cases where we 
have, without explaining why, skipped over a standing analysis 
altogether.  As a result, we have neither directly addressed standing 
nor applied the Alterra test in any of our abortion cases. 
Instead, to the extent standing was considered, we seem to 
have collapsed the analysis into the grounds for obtaining a 
temporary injunction without considering which standing test to 
apply or whether an abortion provider can meet that test.  See 
Gainesville Woman Care, 210 So. 3d at 1247 (“Petitioners have 
established a substantial likelihood of success on the merits, one of 
the requirements of granting a temporary injunction, as well as all 
other grounds for the entry of a temporary injunction.” (emphasis 
added)).  For that reason, addressing standing alone here would 
have only added to the inconsistencies in our cases. 
Second, both parties have asked us to apply the federal third-
party standing test as applied in Alterra.  But as explained above, 
we have applied that test once.  And, for many reasons, I question 
the wisdom of perpetuating the standard here.  For one, I do not 
 
- 61 - 
think we should apply federal standards to textually distinct 
provisions of the Florida Constitution without considering whether 
that standard is independently justified on state law grounds.  For 
another, reflexively adopting the federal third-party standing test is 
particularly troublesome because, in federal courts, it has been 
inconsistently applied and widely criticized.  See, e.g., June Med. 
Servs. L. L. C. v. Russo, 140 S. Ct. 2103, 2142-46 (2020) (Thomas, 
J., dissenting) (noting the test’s inconsistent application, criticizing 
the characterization of third-party standing as prudential in nature, 
and concluding that third-party standing is inconsistent with the 
case-or-controversy requirement of Article III). 
Finally, and critically, neither party has challenged our 
characterization of standing as waivable rather than jurisdictional.  
Similarly, no party has offered an alternative standard to apply in 
the absence of Alterra or an argument as to whether Planned 
Parenthood fails to meet any alternative standard.  As a result, I 
believe this Court properly reaches the merits of this case. 
III. 
While the State’s concession takes care of this case, in future 
cases we should reconsider our standing precedents.  Most 
 
- 62 - 
fundamentally, we should consider from where our standing 
requirements are derived (spoiler alert—it is not the Federal 
Constitution).  For example, is standing in Florida derived only from 
article V’s conception of “judicial power”?  See, e.g., Sons of 
Confederate Veterans v. Henry Cnty. Bd. of Comm’rs, 880 S.E.2d 
168, 185-86 (Ga. 2022) (concluding that standing requirement 
arises from the Georgia Constitution’s judicial power provision).  Or 
does the access to courts provision of article I, section 21 have 
anything to say as to standing? 
Once decided, we will need to clarify the scope of any standing 
requirements, such as whether parties may assert both legal and 
factual injuries or whether only a legal injury will suffice.  See, e.g., 
F. Andrew Hessick, Standing, Injury in Fact, and Private Rights, 93 
Cornell L. Rev. 275, 280-81 (2008) (noting that at common law 
“factual harm without a legal injury was damnum absque injuria 
and provided no basis for relief”).  We will also need to examine 
whether standing requirements are truly subject to waiver, or 
instead whether they are jurisdictional in nature.  And finally, we 
will need to provide a principled methodology to help litigants 
understand which tests to apply when. 
 
- 63 - 
To decide these and other issues related to standing, we will 
need the benefit of the adversarial process and thorough briefing.  
For that reason, and in the proper case, I encourage parties to 
critically assess these and other standing issues and present 
argument to this Court should the opportunity arise. 
LABARGA, J., dissenting. 
 
When the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs23 
“returned to the people and their elected representatives” “the 
authority to regulate abortion,” the decision did not force the state 
of Florida into uncharted territory.  Instead, as history reveals and 
the majority acknowledges, the right to an abortion as a matter of 
Florida law was decided decades ago following two significant post-
Roe24 developments: (1) Florida voters’ 1980 approval of an 
amendment to the Florida Constitution expressly providing a right 
of privacy, and (2) this Court’s 1989 decision in In re T.W., 551 So. 
2d 1186 (Fla. 1989), holding that Florida’s express right of privacy 
 
 
23.  Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Org., 597 U.S. 215, 292 
(2022). 
 
24.  Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973). 
 
- 64 - 
encompasses the right to an abortion.  Nonetheless, today’s 
majority decision recedes from decades of this Court’s precedent 
and holds that “there is no basis under [Florida’s express right of 
privacy] to invalidate” “a recently amended statute that shortens the 
window of time in which a physician may perform an abortion.”  
Majority op. at 2.  I strongly dissent. 
The Right of Privacy 
 
Adopted by Florida voters in 1980, article I, section 23 of the 
Florida Constitution provides: “Every natural person has the right 
to be let alone and free from governmental intrusion into the 
person’s private life except as otherwise provided herein.  This 
section shall not be construed to limit the public’s right of access to 
public records and meetings as provided by law.”  Contrary to the 
majority, I am convinced that in 1980, a Florida voter would have 
understood that the proposed privacy amendment “included broad 
protections for abortion.”  Id. at 46. 
 
The right of privacy is no novel concept.  More than 100 years 
ago, former Michigan Supreme Court Justice and noted legal 
scholar Thomas Cooley described “[t]he right to one’s person” as the 
right “to be let alone.”  Thomas M. Cooley, A Treatise on the Law of 
 
- 65 - 
Torts or the Wrongs Which Arise Independent of Contract 29 (2d ed. 
1888).  When the right “to be let alone” was discussed by Samuel D. 
Warren and Louis D. Brandeis in their Harvard Law Review article 
The Right to Privacy, the article primarily discussed the tort of 
invasion of privacy.  See Samuel D. Warren & Louis D. Brandeis, 
The Right to Privacy, 4 Harv. L. Rev. 193 (1890).  However, the 
authors also made the following salient observation: 
THAT the individual shall have full protection in person 
and in property is a principle as old as the common law; 
but it has been found necessary from time to time to 
define anew the exact nature and extent of such 
protection.  Political, social, and economic changes entail 
the recognition of new rights, and the common law, in its 
eternal youth, grows to meet the demands of society. 
 
Id. at 193.  Thus, even in early considerations of the right of 
privacy, scholars recognized that the right would be one that would 
evolve over time—and it did. 
 
During the twentieth century, political, social, and economic 
changes led to a host of changes in the legal landscape, resulting in 
an expansion of the right of privacy far beyond a right to be free 
from unwanted public exposure.  Without question, one of the most 
significant legal developments was the United States Supreme 
Court’s recognition in Roe of an implicit right of privacy 
 
- 66 - 
guaranteeing the right to an abortion as a matter of federal law.  
However, the right of privacy in the context of decisional autonomy 
took hold several years earlier in Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 
479 (1965) (holding that a state statute prohibiting the use of 
contraceptives violated the right to marital privacy).  It is relevant to 
the analysis of the public understanding of the right of privacy that 
Griswold’s expansion of privacy to reach decisional autonomy 
occurred more than seven years before Roe and fifteen years before 
Florida voters’ adoption of the right of privacy as a matter of state 
constitutional law. 
 
The State’s argument, that the sole context for Florida’s right 
of privacy is informational privacy, seems to have been a step too 
far even for the majority.  Nonetheless, the majority concludes that 
the language of “shall not be construed to limit the public’s right of 
access to public records and meetings as provided by law” provides 
context that “do[es] not lend support to a claim that voters clearly 
understood abortion to be part and parcel of the rights recognized” 
under the right of privacy.  Majority op. at 23.  What is more, it 
reaches this conclusion despite substantial evidence that 
 
- 67 - 
overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that the public understood 
the right of privacy to encompass the right to an abortion. 
Abortion as a Private Matter 
 
Before turning to the public understanding of the right of 
privacy, I write to address the majority’s suggestion that abortion is 
ultimately not a private matter because “the procedure itself 
include[s] medical intervention and require[s] both the presence and 
intrusion of others.”  Id. at 21 (citing Roe, 410 U.S. at 172 
(Rehnquist, J., dissenting)). 
 
The majority acknowledges that an abortion “include[s] 
medical intervention,” see id., but beyond merely “includ[ing] 
medical intervention,” Florida’s statutes regulating abortion—then 
and now—require that the procedure be performed by a physician.  
See § 390.0111(2), Fla. Stat. (2023) (requiring that a termination of 
pregnancy be performed by a physician); Wright v. State, 351 So. 2d 
708 (Fla. 1977) (pre-1980 decision from this Court upholding the 
conviction of a registered nurse who performed an abortion in 
violation of statute requiring that the procedure be performed by a 
physician).  The “others” required to be present and involved in the 
procedure are physicians and medical personnel.  In the interest of 
 
- 68 - 
patient privacy, medical matters, including countless forms of 
medical procedures, are broadly afforded confidentiality protections 
with narrowly tailored exceptions. 
 
And notably, the involvement of a physician was not fatal to 
the privacy issue in Griswold, where the United States Supreme 
Court said: “This law [prohibiting the use of contraceptives], 
however, operates directly on an intimate relation of husband and 
wife and their physician’s role in one aspect of that relation.”  381 
U.S. at 482 (emphasis added). 
 
As a matter of necessity, physicians and medical personnel are 
routinely involved in a wide range of medical procedures, decisions, 
and other medical matters.  The majority attempts to limit today’s 
decision to the issue of abortion.  See majority op. at 10 note 7 
(“[T]oday we do not revisit our precedents outside the abortion 
context.”).  However, I fear that parties will rely on the majority’s 
reasoning—that the involvement of “others” in an abortion 
procedure defeats privacy—in attempts to undermine the broad 
privacy protections that are extended in the medical context. 
 
- 69 - 
The Public Understanding of Roe v. Wade 
and the Right of Privacy 
 
The majority “acknowledge[s] that the public understanding of 
the term ‘privacy’ was, to some extent, informed by the United 
States Supreme Court’s 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade,” observing 
that “[f]ollowing that decision, the phrase ‘right to privacy’ gained 
new connotations that, for the first time, included the choice to have 
an abortion.”  Majority op. at 29 (emphasis added).  The majority 
continues: 
In Planned Parenthood’s view, this aspect of federal 
privacy jurisprudence should control our analysis here.  
Specifically, Planned Parenthood argues that Florida 
voters would have internalized Roe’s definition of privacy 
when they voted for the privacy amendment.  Indeed, 
Planned Parenthood has repeatedly asserted that the 
public understanding of this privacy definition was so 
engrained by 1980 that even without a specific mention of 
the term abortion, the Privacy Clause unequivocally 
included such a right by implication. 
Though this argument has some force, we cannot 
agree with Planned Parenthood that the backdrop of Roe 
conclusively establishes how a voter would have 
understood the provision. 
 
Id. at 29-30 (emphasis added).  The majority concludes that 
“[c]onsequently, while Roe is relevant to our analysis of public 
meaning, it is not dispositive.”  Id. at 32.  I could not disagree more. 
 
- 70 - 
 
The majority correctly recognizes the significant impact of Roe 
but stops short of the reality that Roe, having fundamentally 
changed the landscape of abortion rights on a national scale by 
redefining the scope of the right of privacy, was key to the public 
understanding of the right of privacy.  During the seven-year 
interval between Roe and Florida voters’ adoption of the right of 
privacy, I find it inconceivable that Americans—and more 
specifically, Floridians—were not aware that the right of privacy 
encompassed the right to an abortion.  I agree with the petitioners 
that “the public understanding of [Roe’s] privacy definition was so 
engrained by 1980 that even without a specific mention of the term 
abortion, the Privacy Clause unequivocally included such a right by 
implication.”  Id. at 29-30. 
 
In fact, the majority notes the controversial impact of Roe’s 
reasoning, which reinforces that the public would have understood 
the right of privacy encompassed the right to an abortion.  See id. at 
14 (stating that Roe “left even progressive legal scholars baffled at 
how such a right could be gleaned from the constitution’s text,” and 
quoting Dobbs, 597 U.S. at 268 (“Roe’s constitutional analysis was 
far outside the bounds of any reasonable interpretation of the 
 
- 71 - 
various constitutional provisions to which it vaguely pointed.”)).  
Contrary to the majority’s position, evidence of the discussion 
surrounding Roe’s reasoning is probative that the public 
understood the right of privacy to encompass the right to an 
abortion, and to so conclude does not require the “analytical leap” 
that the majority suggests it does.  See id. at 31.  Roe’s opponents 
strenuously disapproved of basing the right to an abortion on the 
right of privacy; just as strenuously, Roe’s supporters agreed with 
the Supreme Court’s analysis.  The common denominator is the 
understanding that the right to an abortion was tied to the right of 
privacy. 
The Nationwide Understanding of Roe and the Right of Privacy 
A decision that triggered pervasive national coverage, Roe was 
publicly discussed and debated in a way that most judicial 
decisions—even those decided by the United States Supreme 
Court—are not.  Media outlets across the nation reported on the 
landmark decision. 
On the day that Roe was decided, Associated Press articles 
announcing the seminal decision were published on the front pages 
of newspapers nationwide, many explaining that the decision “was 
 
- 72 - 
based predominantly on what [Justice] Blackmun called a right of 
privacy.”25  The nightly news programs on the major television 
networks also reported on Roe to an audience of tens of millions of 
viewers.  The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite—a news 
program with, at that time, a consistent audience of twenty million 
or more viewers—covered the decision in a segment lasting more 
than three minutes, noting that “[t]he nine justices made abortion 
 
 
25.  See, e.g., Associated Press, Abortion Law Out, Mexico 
Ledger, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, Barry Schweid, 
Abortion Law Struck by Court, The Courier News (Blytheville), 
Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, Abortions Allowed During 1st 
6 Months, The Daily Chronicle (Centralia), Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; 
Associated Press, Barry Schweid, Blackmun Cites ‘Right of Privacy’ 
Court Bars Restricting Three-Month Abortions, The Index-Journal 
(Greenwood), Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, Court Strikes 
Down Abortion Law, The Neosho Daily News, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; 
Associated Press, Court Strikes Down Abortion Law, Aiken Standard, 
Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, Court Strikes Down Texas 
Abortion Law, The Daily Times-News (Burlington), Jan. 22, 1973, at 
1; Associated Press, Barry Schweid, Decision Will Affect 44 States, 
Del Rio News-Herald, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, High 
Court Upholds Medical Abortions, Waukesha Daily Freeman, 
Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, Key Abortion Ruling by 
Supreme Court, Santa Cruz Sentinel, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; 
Associated Press, Rule on Abortions, The Sedalia Democrat, Jan. 22, 
1973, at 1; Associated Press, States Can’t Block Early Abortions, 
The Bismarck Tribune, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, 
Supreme Court Upholds Women’s Abortion Rights, Fairbanks Daily 
News-Miner, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1; Associated Press, Texas Law 
Struck Down, 7-2, The Vernon Daily Record, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1-2. 
 
- 73 - 
largely a private matter.”  CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite, 
featuring George Herman in Washington (CBS television broadcast 
Jan. 22, 1973), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dccagy9o5yk 
(available on the CBS News YouTube channel). 
Throughout the nation, local journalists also published 
articles announcing and explaining Roe, as did opinion writers in 
making their arguments.26  In some articles, even the titles 
emphasized that the right to an abortion was based on the right of 
privacy.  See, e.g., Supreme Court: Right of Privacy Includes Abortion, 
The Georgia Bulletin, Feb. 22, 1973, at 2 (calling Roe “one of the 
biggest news stories of the year”); Chicago Daily News Services, 
‘Privacy’ is Reason for Abortion Ruling, Omaha World-Herald, 
 
 
26.  See, e.g., Bonni McKeown, Abortion’s Status in West 
Virginia: Legal Question Affects Availability, Beckley Post-Herald, 
June 21, 1976, at 5 (explaining that Roe invalidated most states’ 
abortion laws based on the balancing of the state’s interests versus 
a woman’s right of privacy); Washington Post, Editorial, Abortion: 
19th Century, The Evening Times (Sayre), Feb. 3, 1973, at 4 (same); 
Joseph Kraft, Opinion, The High Court Speaks Up for Privacy, The 
Greensboro Record, Jan. 29, 1973, at 20 (same); Joseph Kraft, 
Opinion, Ruling Revealed Conservative Court, The Montana 
Standard, Jan. 28, 1973, at 6 (same); Joseph Kraft, Opinion, The 
Abortion Ruling, The Roanoke Times, Jan. 27, 1973, at 6 (same); 
Mary Smith, Abortion Ruling Draws Varied Reactions Here, The 
Lawton Constitution, Jan. 23, 1973, at 4 (same). 
 
- 74 - 
Jan. 23, 1973, at 18; Associated Press, ‘Right of Privacy’ Cited in 
Action Against States, Reno Gazette-Journal, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1. 
Roe and its extensive coverage informed legislators and their 
constituents that the right of privacy under the U.S. Constitution 
protected the right to an abortion.  Far from an issue that faded 
after one or two news cycles, abortion remained a prevalent issue 
during the seven years between Roe and the 1980 adoption of 
Florida’s privacy amendment.  The three-trimester framework laid 
out in Roe balanced the state’s interests against the mother’s right 
of privacy, and based on that balancing test, abortion laws in 
multiple states, including Florida, were struck down on federal 
privacy grounds.  See Fla. Women’s Med. Clinic, Inc. v. Smith, 478 F. 
Supp. 233 (S.D. Fla. 1979) (holding unconstitutional, on federal 
privacy grounds, administrative rules implementing Florida 
abortion statute); Jones v. Smith, 474 F. Supp. 1160 (S.D. Fla. 
1979) (granting, on federal privacy grounds, a preliminary 
injunction against the enforcement of Florida abortion statute); Coe 
v. Gerstein, 376 F. Supp. 695 (S.D. Fla. 1973) (holding Florida 
abortion statute unconstitutional on federal privacy grounds). 
 
- 75 - 
As courts, legislatures, and the public continued to confront 
the topic of abortion, the media continued to cover Roe, noting the 
historical and legal context: “In the famous 1973 Roe vs. Wade 
case, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that choosing abortion was part 
of a woman’s right to privacy”;27 “The Supreme Court legalized 
abortions in 1973, basing its landmark ruling on a woman’s right to 
privacy.”28 
In 1980, only two months before Florida’s privacy amendment 
vote, a United States district court judge struck down North 
Dakota’s new abortion law regulating first trimester abortions, 
applying Roe and stating that “[t]he decision to obtain an abortion 
free from governmental interference is a fundamental right founded 
 
 
27.  Kevin M. Russell, Letter to the Editor, Does The Bill 
Regulating Abortions Deny Women Their Rights?, The Record 
(Hackensack), June 17, 1979, at 105. 
 
28.  Associated Press, Top Court to Decide Abortion Law Rule, 
Gettysburg Times, Nov. 28, 1979, at 6; Associated Press, Abortion 
Issue Back Before Supreme Court, The Index-Journal (Greenwood), 
Nov. 27, 1979, at 8; Associated Press, Abortion Issue Goes Back to 
High Court, News-Journal (Mansfield), Nov. 27, 1979, at 7; 
Associated Press, Abortion Issue is Back Before the Supreme Court, 
Poughkeepsie Journal, Nov. 27, 1979, at 6; Associated Press, High 
Court to Rule on Abortion Issue, Daily Sitka Sentinel, Nov. 27, 1979, 
at 2. 
 
- 76 - 
in the right of privacy implicit in the Constitution.”  Leigh v. Olson, 
497 F. Supp. 1340, 1343 (D.N.D. 1980); Associated Press, Most of 
Abortion Law Tossed Out, The Bismarck Tribune, Sept. 30, 1980, at 
1 (front-page newspaper article in North Dakota quoting the court’s 
decision). 
Following Roe, pro-choice advocates praised the decision for 
recognizing a woman’s right of privacy, while Catholic bishops and 
other pro-life advocates spoke out against Roe, asserting that the 
decision let the right of privacy outweigh the right to life: “In effect, 
the Court is saying that the right of privacy takes precedence over 
the right to life.”  U.S. Bishops Issue Message on Abortion, Panama 
City News-Herald, Mar. 4, 1973, at 40; Bishops Reject High Court’s 
Abortion Ruling, Issue Pastoral Applications for Catholics, The True 
Voice (Omaha), Feb. 16, 1973, at 1.29 
 
 
29.  See also Katherine Lunine, Letter to the Editor, Preserve 
Constitutional Rights, The Journal News (Hamilton), Feb. 1, 1977, at 
4 (showing that pro-choice actors argue that government 
interference with abortion is limited by a woman’s right of privacy); 
Associated Press, Abortion Ban Voted by House, The Corbin Times-
Tribune, Sept. 17, 1976, at 12 (same); Associated Press, Betty Anne 
Williams, Anti-Abortionists Stage Ban Rally in Washington, The 
Robesonian (Lumberton), Jan. 22, 1976, at 2 (same); Associated 
Press, ‘March for Life’ Again Seeks Amendment to Ban Abortion, The 
Index-Journal (Greenwood), Jan. 22, 1976, at 3 (same); Associated 
 
- 77 - 
Ultimately, whether they supported the Supreme Court’s 
decision in Roe or not, Americans in 1980 would have understood 
that the right of privacy encompassed the right to an abortion. 
The Public Understanding of Florida Voters in 1980 
 
More specifically, and especially relevant to the present case, 
Florida media coverage after Roe illustrates that in 1980 Florida 
voters would have understood the privacy amendment to 
encompass the right to an abortion.  The wealth of primary sources 
from Florida strongly indicates what voters would have known. 
Newspapers across Florida began reporting on Roe the day it 
was decided: January 22, 1973.  In explaining the decision, these 
articles discussed the federal right of privacy as the basis for the 
right to an abortion.  Adam Richardson, The Originalist Case for 
Why the Florida Constitution’s Right of Privacy Protects the Right to 
an Abortion, 53 Stetson L. Rev. 101, 125 (2023).  Like newspapers 
throughout the nation, Florida newspapers published an Associated 
 
Press, Washington Rally Marks Abortion Anniversary, The Times 
Record (Troy), Jan. 22, 1976, at 3 (same); United Press 
International, High Court 7-2 Ruling on Abortion Praised, 
Condemned, Traverse City Record-Eagle, Jan. 23, 1973, at 24 
(same). 
 
- 78 - 
Press article quoting Roe’s pronouncement that the right of privacy 
“is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not 
to terminate her pregnancy.”  See, e.g., Associated Press, Court 
Strikes Down Abortion Laws, The Pensacola News, Jan. 22, 1973, at 
1; Associated Press, High Court KOs Ban on Abortion, Tallahassee 
Democrat, Jan. 22, 1973, at 1.  Coverage of Roe and of this broad 
privacy right also made the front pages of newspapers in Orlando 
and Fort Myers.  See Washington Post Dispatch, High Court Nullifies 
Abortion Laws, Sentinel Star (Orlando), Jan. 23, 1973, at 1; 
Associated Press, Six-Month Abortions Upheld, Fort Myers News-
Press, Jan. 23, 1973, at 1. 
In 1980, the right of privacy and its inextricable connection to 
the right to an abortion continued to permeate Florida news.  When 
Justice Douglas died in January 1980, Florida newspapers reported 
his legacy with mention of his majority opinion in Griswold as a 
precursor to Roe.  Richardson, supra, at 131; James W. Fox Jr., A 
Historical and Originalist Defense of Abortion in Florida, 75 Rutgers 
U. L. Rev. 393, 427-28 (2023).  For example, a Miami Herald article 
noted that after Griswold, “the [United States Supreme] court 
moved to rule, in 1973, that a woman in early pregnancy has a 
 
- 79 - 
constitutional right of privacy to choose abortion without 
government interference.”  Aaron Epstein, William O. Douglas: 
Champion of Underdogs, Unpopular Ideas, The Miami Herald, 
Jan. 27, 1980, at 5-E. 
Florida news coverage of the United States Supreme Court 
continued with reports of abortion cases—and their right of privacy 
issues.  In discussing the Supreme Court’s 1980 oral arguments in 
H. L. v. Matheson, 450 U.S. 398 (1981), which involved parental 
notification of abortion, the Miami Herald reported that “[o]ut of this 
conflict between a minor’s right to privacy and her parents’ 
obligation to care for her has emerged a constitutional issue that 
was accepted Monday for review by the U.S. Supreme Court.”  
Aaron Epstein, Court Will Examine Parents’ Notification for Minor’s 
Abortion, The Miami Herald, Feb. 26, 1980, at 10-A.  And explaining 
the Court’s decision in Harris v. McRae, 448 U.S. 297 (1980), which 
upheld the Hyde Amendment’s restrictions on the use of federal 
funds to pay for an abortion, the Pensacola News reported that the 
decision “had nothing to do with the legality of abortion itself” 
because “[t]he Supreme Court legalized abortion in its landmark 
1973 decision” in which “the court said a woman’s right to privacy 
 
- 80 - 
makes her decision to have an abortion a matter only for her and 
her doctor during the first three months of her pregnancy.”  
Associated Press, High Court Rules on Abortions, The Pensacola 
News, June 30, 1980, at 1. 
Florida newspapers covered major party platforms, including 
their stances on abortion.  These articles linked the abortion issue 
with the right of privacy.  The Fort Lauderdale News and other 
Florida newspapers published a syndicated column indicating that 
although the Republican platform did not yet have a consensus on 
abortion, the Supreme Court had made its determination in 1973 
by, in the author’s view, “forging from a ‘privacy right’ a scythe to 
mow down state laws that expressed various community judgments 
about abortion.”  See George Will, Opinion, Bridges to Cross; 
Bridges to Burn, Fort Lauderdale News, July 17, 1980, at 18A; 
Richardson, supra, at 132 n.177 (observing that the column ran in 
Florida Today, Fort Myers News-Press, Palm Beach Post, Pensacola 
News, Sentinel Star (Orlando), St. Lucie News Tribune, St. Petersburg 
Times, Stuart News, and Tallahassee Democrat).  Covering the 
Democratic platform, the St. Petersburg Times reported that 
delegates had voted for a platform statement opposing “government 
 
- 81 - 
interference in the reproductive decisions of Americans” and 
“restrictions on funding for health services for the poor that deny 
poor women especially the right to exercise a constitutionally-
guaranteed right to privacy.”  Charles Stafford, Kennedy Stirs 
Democrats with Rousing Call to Arms, St. Petersburg Times, Aug. 13, 
1980, at 1-A (quoting the statement under the label “ABORTION”). 
Florida newspapers also covered statements by pro-choice 
activists and by pro-life activists that demonstrate both groups’ 
understanding of abortion as part of the right of privacy.  See 
Associated Press, Planned Parenthood Waving the Flag, The Tampa 
Tribune, Oct. 4, 1980, at 7-D (“In recent years we have faced an 
increasingly vocal and at times violent minority which seeks to deny 
all of us our fundamental rights of privacy and individual decision-
making.”); Carol Jeffares, Her Love of Life Makes Her Stand, Fight for 
It, The Tampa Tribune, Sept. 20, 1980, at 5-Pasco (“The abortion 
law is based on the woman’s right to privacy.  It says ‘a woman’s 
right to privacy supersedes the fetus’s life.’ ”); Richardson, supra, at 
132.  With inflammatory language, both pro-choice and pro-life 
letters to the editor in Florida newspapers further demonstrate this 
understanding.  See Joyce Tarnow, Letter to the Editor, Vote Out 
 
- 82 - 
Anti-Abortionists, Fort Lauderdale News, Jan. 29, 1980, at 26-A 
(“The U.S. Constitution guarantees each of us the right of privacy, 
the right of religious freedom and the right to pursue happiness 
however we define it.  Compulsory pregnancy is a denial of each of 
these rights.”); Hugh Pope, Letter to the Editor, The Tampa Tribune-
Times, Nov. 2, 1980, at 2-C (“There cannot be a more compelling 
reason for intelligent and patriotic Americans to vote Republican 
than to save lives!  Stripped of all its sugarcoated slogans—‘freedom 
of choice[,]’ [] ‘woman’s right to privacy[,]’ [] etc., etc., abortion is 
legalized murder.”). 
The foregoing primary sources from Florida and from across 
the United States are examples of many.  These sources should not 
be overlooked, and their impact should not be undervalued.  In a 
quest to uncover the original public meaning of the Florida 
Constitution’s Privacy Clause, they reveal that Roe was widely 
known for its holding and for its reasoning.  Thus, in 1980, Florida 
voters would have understood the right of privacy as encompassing 
the right to an abortion. 
 
I hasten to add that the coverage discussed above, specifically 
connecting Roe and the right to an abortion to the right of privacy, 
 
- 83 - 
occurred at a time when Americans relied heavily on print media 
and national news broadcasts. 
Florida Courts Acknowledge Right of Privacy Under Roe 
 
By the time Florida voters adopted the privacy amendment in 
1980, Florida court decisions had repeatedly acknowledged the 
right of privacy expanded under federal law by Roe.  While these 
decisions did not conclude that a right of privacy existed on state 
law grounds, they do provide further support that the public would 
have understood the link between the right to an abortion and the 
right of privacy. 
 
In 1977, this Court stated that “Justice Blackmun’s 
articulation in Roe v. Wade of the limited scope of the right to 
privacy remains the current state of the law.”  Laird v. State, 342 So. 
2d 962, 965 (Fla. 1977) (emphasis added) (rejecting argument that a 
right of privacy protected the possession of marijuana in the home).  
Even the dissenting opinion in Laird observed: “A constitutional 
right to privacy has been clearly established by the United States 
Supreme Court in . . . Roe . . . .”  Id. at 966 (Adkins, J., dissenting) 
(emphasis added). 
 
- 84 - 
 
In Jones v. Smith, 278 So. 2d 339 (Fla. 4th DCA 1973), cert. 
denied, Jones v. Smith, 415 U.S. 958 (1974), a case involving the 
abortion context, the Fourth District Court of Appeal rejected the 
claim of a putative father that he was entitled to prevent the mother 
from obtaining an abortion.  The district court rejected that 
argument, saying: 
 
The recent decisions of the United States Supreme 
Court in Roe v. Wade . . . and Doe v. Bolton [410 U.S. 179 
(1973)], while dealing with the constitutionality of 
statutes, set forth what we perceive to be the essential 
and underlying factor in the determination of this appeal.  
That factor is the “right of privacy” of the mother. 
 
Id. at 341 (emphasis added).  Additionally, in discussing the right of 
privacy, the district court noted an observation made by the United 
States Supreme Court in Union Pacific Railway Co. v. Botsford, 141 
U.S. 250, 251 (1891): “As well said by Judge Cooley, ‘The right to 
one’s person may be said to be a right of complete immunity to be 
let alone.’ ”  278 So. 2d at 342 (quoting Babbitz v. McCann, 310 F. 
Supp. 293, 299 (E.D. Wisc. 1970)). 
 
Moreover, in Wright, the statute at issue required that an 
abortion be performed by a physician and at an approved facility.  
The petitioner, a registered nurse, challenged the approved facility 
 
- 85 - 
requirement on the basis that under Roe and other federal 
decisions, the requirement violated the right of privacy.  351 So. 2d 
at 710.  This Court ultimately upheld the petitioner’s conviction on 
the ground that the statute constitutionally prohibited non-
physicians from performing an abortion.  Despite concluding that 
the approved facility requirement was unconstitutional, this Court 
rejected the petitioner’s privacy argument, stating: “The right to 
privacy in the abortion decision, recognized in Roe . . . as belonging 
to the pregnant woman in consultation with her physician, gives 
way to state power to regulate as the embryo or fetus develops.”  Id. 
at 710.30 
 
 
30.  Other decisions not involving abortion-related issues also 
recognized the right of privacy established in Roe.  See, e.g., 
Rodriguez v. State, 378 So. 2d 7, 8 n.2 (Fla. 2d DCA 1979) (“In Roe, 
the court balanced the fundamental right to privacy of a woman’s 
decision whether or not to terminate pregnancy against state 
interest to limit that right to safeguard health and potential life.”); 
Franklin v. White Egret Condo., Inc., 358 So. 2d 1084, 1089 (Fla. 4th 
DCA 1977) (observing on motion for rehearing that “[t]he right to be 
free of unwarranted interference with the decision to have children 
has been identified on numerous occasions by the United States 
Supreme Court as one of the matters protected by the right of 
privacy”); Day v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 328 So. 2d 560, 562 (Fla. 
2d DCA 1976) (“The decision to have an abortion during the first 
trimester has been held to be private and personal to the individual 
woman.  The primary interest, at least in the early stages of 
pregnancy, is that of the woman and her right to privacy.” (citations 
 
- 86 - 
Roe and the Privacy Amendment Debate 
 
According to the majority, the relative absence of the topic of 
abortion from the debate over Florida’s proposed privacy 
amendment is evidence that the public did not understand that the 
right to an abortion was included in the scope of the proposed right 
of privacy.  See majority op. at 41-42 (citing Fox, supra, at 443-44).  
However, Professor Fox explains why the topic of abortion was not a 
part of the amendment debate: 
Abortion would only have been debated if its coverage 
within the right to privacy were in dispute or were not yet 
established in law.  But as of 1980 the protection of 
abortion through the right to privacy was the established 
law.  It would hardly make sense for debates about 
section 23 to invest time and effort re-arguing the 
reasoning of Roe, let alone arguing that the terms “right 
to privacy,” “right to be let alone,” and “free from 
governmental intrusion” would plainly mean what they 
already meant in federal law. 
 
Fox, supra, at 442-43 (emphasis omitted).  Indeed, Roe’s extension 
of the right of privacy to the abortion context so dominated the 
abortion discussion that it would have been well understood that 
 
omitted)).  Again, these cases are relevant to demonstrate that after 
Roe, and before voters adopted Florida’s privacy amendment, the 
right to an abortion as a matter of a right of privacy would have 
been well understood. 
 
- 87 - 
the right of privacy adopted by Florida voters included the right to 
an abortion. 
In re T.W. 
[S]tate courts cannot rest when they have afforded their 
citizens the full protections of the federal Constitution. 
State constitutions, too, are a font of individual liberties, 
their protections often extending beyond those required 
by the Supreme Court’s interpretation of federal law.  The 
legal revolution which has brought federal law to the fore 
must not be allowed to inhibit the independent protective 
force of state law—for without it, the full realization of 
our liberties cannot be guaranteed. 
 
William J. Brennan, Jr., State Constitutions and the Protection of 
Individual Rights, 90 Harv. L. Rev. 489, 491 (1977).  Indeed, “[t]he 
citizens of Florida opted for more protection from governmental 
intrusion when they approved article I, section 23 of the Florida 
Constitution.  This amendment is an independent, freestanding 
constitutional provision which declares the fundamental right to 
privacy.”  Winfield v. Div. of Pari-Mutuel Wagering, 477 So. 2d 544, 
548 (Fla. 1985).  The amendment “was intentionally phrased in 
strong terms . . . in order to make the privacy right as strong as 
possible.”  Id. 
 
It was in the context of Florida’s broad right of privacy that 
almost thirty-five years ago, this Court held as a matter of state 
 
- 88 - 
constitutional law that “Florida’s privacy provision is clearly 
implicated in a woman’s decision of whether or not to continue her 
pregnancy.”  T.W., 551 So. 2d at 1192.  T.W. explained: “[W]e have 
said that the [privacy] amendment provides ‘an explicit textual 
foundation for those privacy interests inherent in the concept of 
liberty which may not otherwise be protected by specific 
constitutional provisions.’ ”  Id. (quoting Rasmussen v. S. Fla. Blood 
Serv., 500 So. 2d 533, 536 (Fla. 1987)). 
 
Unfortunately, the majority’s decision to recede from T.W. and 
its progeny constitutes the rejection of a “decades-long line of cases 
hold[ing] that the Privacy Clause ‘embraces more privacy interests, 
and extends more protection to the individual in those interests, 
than [does] the federal Constitution.’ ”  Petitioners’ Opening Brief at 
41 (emphases omitted) (quoting T.W., 551 So. 2d at 1192).  The 
decision is an affront to this state’s tradition of embracing a broad 
scope of the right of privacy.31 
 
 
31.  In 2012, Florida reaffirmed this tradition when voters 
rejected a state constitutional amendment that would have 
narrowed protections for abortion rights in Florida by requiring that 
the protections be no greater than those provided under federal law.  
Additionally, the amendment would have overruled T.W. and other 
decisions concluding that Florida protections for abortion rights 
 
- 89 - 
 
In deciding to reexamine T.W. and ultimately to recede from 
T.W. and its progeny, the majority states: “Since Roe featured 
prominently in T.W., we think it fair to also point out that the T.W. 
majority did not examine or offer a reasoned response to the 
existing criticism of that decision or consider whether it was 
doctrinally coherent.  This was a significant misstep because Roe 
did not provide a settled definition of privacy rights.”  Majority op. 
at 13-14.  I disagree. 
 
T.W. did acknowledge that “the workability of the trimester 
system and the soundness of Roe itself have been seriously 
questioned in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, 492 U.S. 490 
(1989).”  T.W., 551 So. 2d at 1190.  However, this Court correctly 
 
exceed those provided under federal law.  In a decisive vote, more 
than fifty-five percent of Florida voters rejected the amendment.  
See Initiative Information: Prohibition on Public Funding of Abortions; 
Construction of Abortion Rights, Fla. Dep’t of State, Division of 
Elections, 
https://dos.elections.myflorida.com/initiatives/initdetail.asp?accou
nt=10&seqnum=82 (last visited Mar. 19, 2024). 
 
While the petitioners conceded during the oral argument in 
this case that Florida voters’ rejection of the abortion amendment in 
2012 was not relevant to the public understanding of the right of 
privacy adopted in 1980, the 2012 amendment rejection is still 
relevant to an understanding of Florida’s tradition with respect to 
the right of privacy. 
 
- 90 - 
observed that “[Roe] for now remains the federal law.”  See id.  As 
such, this Court was not obligated in T.W. to “examine or offer a 
reasoned response to the existing criticism of [Roe] or consider 
whether it was doctrinally coherent.”  Majority op. at 13-14.  It was 
“three years after T.W.” and almost twelve years after Florida voters’ 
1980 adoption of the right of privacy that “the U.S. Supreme Court 
abandoned Roe’s position that the right to abortion was grounded 
in any sort of [federal] privacy right.”  See id. at 15 (emphasis 
added) (citing Planned Parenthood of Se. Penn. v. Casey, 505 U.S. 
833, 846 (1992)).  Even then, the United States Supreme Court did 
not abandon Roe’s “essential holding.”  Casey, 505 U.S. at 846. 
 
I reemphasize that T.W. was decided on state law grounds and 
with a clear understanding of the breadth of Florida’s right of 
privacy as discussed in Winfield.  To be certain, Roe was 
fundamental to the public understanding of the right of privacy as 
encompassing the right to an abortion.  However, T.W. did not rely 
on Roe or the federal constitution to determine that Florida’s right 
of privacy included the right to an abortion.  See T.W., 551 So. 2d at 
1196 (“We expressly decide this case on state law grounds and cite 
federal precedent only to the extent that it illuminates Florida 
 
- 91 - 
law.”).  Because this Court based its decision squarely on Florida 
law, there is no basis for upending decades of precedent that give 
effect to Florida’s broad right of privacy. 
Beyond Today’s Decision 
 
The impact of today’s decision extends far beyond the fifteen-
week ban at issue in this case.  By operation of state statute, the 
majority’s decision will result in even more stringent abortion 
restrictions in this state.  While not before this Court in the present 
case, it is an irrefutable effect of today’s decision that chapter 2023-
21, Laws of Florida, also known as the Heartbeat Protection Act, 
will take effect in short order.  Chapter 2023-21 amends section 
390.0111, Florida Statutes (among other statutes), and with limited 
exceptions, it bans abortions beyond the gestational age of six 
weeks. 
 
The Act provides that the ban will take effect thirty days after 
any of the following events: (1) a decision by this Court holding that 
Florida’s constitutional right to privacy does not include a right to 
abortion; (2) a decision by this Court in the present case allowing the 
fifteen-week ban to remain in effect; (3) an amendment to the Florida 
Constitution clarifying that Florida’s constitutional right of privacy 
 
- 92 - 
does not include the right to an abortion; or (4) a decision from this 
Court after March 7, 2023, that recedes in whole or part from any of 
the following: T.W., North Florida Women’s Health v. State, 866 So. 
2d 612 (Fla. 2003), and Gainesville Woman Care, LLC v. State, 210 
So. 3d 1243 (Fla. 2017).  See ch. 2023-21, § 9, Laws of Fla.  Today’s 
decision implicates three of these four events, meaning that the 
Act’s six-week ban will take effect in thirty days. 
Conclusion 
 
“The document that the [majority] releases [today] is in the 
form of a judicial opinion interpreting a [provision of the Florida 
Constitution] . . . .”  Bostock v. Clayton Co., 590 U.S. 644, 683 
(2020) (Alito, J., dissenting).  However, I lament that what the 
majority has done today supplants Florida voters’ understanding—
then and now—that the right of privacy includes the right to an 
abortion. 
 
The majority concludes that the public understanding of the 
right of privacy did not encompass the right to an abortion.  
However, the dominance of Roe in the public discourse makes it 
inconceivable that in 1980, Florida voters did not associate abortion 
with the right of privacy. 
 
- 93 - 
 
Because of this, and with deep dismay at the action the 
majority takes today, I dissent. 
Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal 
Direct Conflict of Decisions 
 
First District - Case No. 1D22-2034 
 
(Leon County) 
 
Whitney Leigh White, Jennifer Dalven, and Johanna Zacarias of 
American Civil Liberties Union Foundation, New York, New York, 
 
for Petitioners Gainesville Woman Care, LLC, Indian Rocks 
Woman’s Center, Inc., St. Petersburg Woman’s Health Center, 
Inc., and Tampa Woman’s Health Center, Inc., 
 
Autumn Katz and Caroline Sacerdote of Center for Reproductive 
Rights, New York, New York, 
 
for Petitioner A Woman’s Choice of Jacksonville, Inc. 
 
Jennifer Sandman of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, 
New York, New York, 
 
for Petitioners Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central 
Florida, Planned Parenthood of South, East, and North 
Florida, and Shelly Hsiao-Ying Tien, M.D., M.P.H. 
 
April A. Otterberg and Shoba Pillay of Jenner & Block LLP, Chicago, 
Illinois; and Daniel Tilley of American Civil Liberties Union 
Foundation of Florida, Miami, Florida; Benjamin James Stevenson, 
American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Florida, Pensacola, 
Florida, and Nicholas L.V. Warren of American Civil Liberties Union 
Foundation of Florida, Inc., Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Petitioners 
 
 
- 94 - 
Ashley Moody, Attorney General, Henry C. Whitaker, Solicitor 
General, Jeffrey Paul DeSousa, Chief Deputy Solicitor General, 
Daniel William Bell, Chief Deputy Solicitor General, Nathan A. 
Forrester, Senior Deputy Solicitor General, David M. Costello, 
Deputy Solicitor General, Darrick W. Monson, Assistant Solicitor 
General, Zachary Grouev, Solicitor General Fellow, John M. Guard, 
Chief Deputy Attorney General, James H. Percival, Chief of Staff, 
and Natalie P. Christmas, Assistant Attorney General, Office of the 
Attorney General Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Respondent 
 
Brad F. Barrios of Turkel Cuva Barrios, P.A., Tampa, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae Law Professors 
 
Jonathan B. Miller and Hilary Burke Chan of Public Rights Project, 
Oakland, California; and Matthew A. Goldberger of Matthew A. 
Goldberger, P.A., West Palm Beach, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae Current and Former Elected Representatives 
for Reproductive Justice 
 
Kimberly A. Parker, Lesley F. McColl, and Aleksandr Sverdlik of 
Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, Washington, District of 
Columbia, and Meghan G. Wingert of Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale 
and Dorr LLP, New York, New York; and Sean Shaw of Swope 
Rodante, Tampa, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae American College of Obstetricians and 
Gynecologists, American Medical Association, and Society for 
Maternal-Fetal Medicine 
 
Miranda Schiller, Sarah M. Sternlieb, Robert Niles-Weed, and 
Elizabeth McLean of Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, New York, New 
York, Charlotte McFaddin and Caroline Elvig of Weil, Gotshal & 
Manges LLP, Washington, District of Columbia, and Edward Soto of 
Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, Miami, Florida, 
 
 
- 95 - 
 
for Amicus Curiae Floridians for Reproductive Freedom 
 
Angela C. Vigil, Robert H. Moore, and Paul Chander of Baker & 
McKenzie LLP, Miami, Florida; and Francisca D. Fajana of 
LatinoJustice PRLDEF, New York, New York, and Emily M. Galindo 
of LatinoJustice PRLDEF, Orlando, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae LatinoJustice PRLDEF, Florida Access 
Network, National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice, 
Esperanza United, and A.L. 
 
Brian J. Stack and Robert Harris of Stack Fernandez & Harris, P.A., 
Miami, Florida; and Sarah B. Gutman, Lilianna Rembar, and 
Caroline Soussloff of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, New York, 
New York, and Jennifer Kennedy Park of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & 
Hamilton, San Francisco, California, 
 
for Amici Curiae Sanctuary for Families, Legal Momentum, 
The National Organization for Women Foundation, The Rapid 
Benefits Group Fund, Women for Abortion and Reproductive 
Rights, Margaret A. Baldwin, JD, Professor Cyra Choudhury, 
Professor Donna K. Coker, Professor Zanita E. Fenton, Doctor 
Kathryn M. Nowotny, PhD, and Jodi Russell 
 
Eugene M. Gelernter and Caitlin A. Ross of Patterson Belknap Webb 
& Tyler LLP, New York, New York; and Courtney Brewer of The Mills 
Firm, P.A., Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae National Council of Jewish Women, Religious 
Coalition for Reproductive Choice, Catholics for Choice, 
Metropolitan Community Churches, National Council of 
Jewish Women - Greater Miami Section, National Council of 
Jewish Women - Palm Beach Section, National Council of 
Jewish Women - Sarasota Manatee Section, National Council 
of Jewish Women - Kendall Section, National Council of 
Jewish Women - Valencia Shores Section, Reconstructionist 
Rabbinical Association, Women’s Rabbinic Network, Moving 
Traditions, Avodah, Bend the Arc: A Jewish Partnership for 
Justice, Jewish Council for Public Affairs, Jewish Orthodox 
 
- 96 - 
Feminist Alliance, Union for Reform Judaism, Central 
Conference of American Rabbis, Men of Reform Judaism, 
Women of Reform Judaism, Rabbinical Assembly, Society for 
Humanistic Judaism, Muslim Women’s Organization, Hindus 
for Human Rights, Sadhana: Coalition of Progressive Hindus, 
Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics, and Ritual (WATER), 
SACReD (Spiritual Alliance of Communities for Reproductive 
Dignity), Faith in Public Life, and Florida Interfaith Coalition 
for Reproductive Health and Justice 
 
Jordan E. Pratt and Christine K. Pratt of First Liberty Institute, 
Washington, District of Columbia, 
 
for Amicus Curiae National Institute of Family and Life 
Advocates 
 
Alan Lawson, Paul C. Huck, Jr., Jason Gonzalez, Amber Stoner 
Nunnally, and Caroline May Poor of Lawson Huck Gonzalez, PLLC, 
Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae Former State Representative John Grant 
 
Christopher Green, University, Mississippi; and Antony B. Kolenc, 
Naples, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae Scholars on original meaning in State 
Constitutional Law 
 
Lynn Fitch, Attorney General, Scott G. Stewart, Solicitor General, 
and Justin L. Matheny, Deputy Solicitor General, Mississippi 
Attorney General’s Office, Jackson, Mississippi; and Samuel J. 
Salario, Jr. of Lawson Huck Gonzalez, PLLC, Tampa, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, 
Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, 
Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, 
South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia 
 
Stephen C. Emmanuel of Ausley McMullen, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
- 97 - 
 
for Amici Curiae Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops and 
the Florida Baptist Convention 
 
Jay Alan Sekulow, Jordan Sekulow, and Olivia F. Summers of 
American Center for Law & Justice, Washington, District of 
Columbia; and Edward L. White III of American Center for Law & 
Justice, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 
 
for Amicus Curiae Charlotte Lozier Institute 
 
Christopher E. Mills of Spero Law LLC, Charleston, South Carolina; 
and Chad Mizelle, Tampa, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae American College of Pediatricians 
 
Edward M. Wenger of Holtzman Vogel Baran Torchinsky & Josefiak, 
PLLC, Washington, District of Columbia, 
 
for Amicus Curiae American Cornerstone Institute 
 
Carlos A. Rey, General Counsel, Kyle E. Gray, Deputy General 
Counsel, The Florida Senate, David Axelman, General Counsel, and 
J. Michael Maida, Deputy General Counsel, The Florida House of 
Representatives, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae The Florida Legislature 
 
Kenneth L. Connor of Connor & Connor, LLC, Aiken, South 
Carolina, 
 
for Amicus Curiae Liberty Counsel Action 
 
S. Dresden Brunner of S. Dresden Brunner, P.A., Naples, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae The Prolife Center at the University of St. 
Thomas (MN) 
 
Patrick Leduc of Law Offices of Patrick Leduc, P.A., Tampa, Florida, 
 
- 98 - 
 
for Amicus Curiae American Association of Pro-Life 
Obstetricians and Gynecologists 
 
Mathew D. Staver, Anita L. Staver, Horatio G. Mihet, and Hugh C. 
Phillips of Liberty Counsel, Orlando, Florida, 
 
for Amici Curiae Frederick Douglass Foundation, The National 
Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, Fiona Jackson 
Center for Pregnancy, and Issues4life Foundation 
 
D. Kent Safriet of Holtzman Vogel Baran Torchinsky & Josefiak, 
PLLC, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America 
 
Denise M. Harle of Alliance Defending Freedom, Lawrenceville, 
Georgia, and Joshua L. Rogers of Alliance Defending Freedom, 
Scottsdale, Arizona, 
 
for Amicus Curiae Concerned Women for America