Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf
Page Number: 182.0

Cite as:  597 U. S. ____ (2022) 

35 

BREYER, SOTOMAYOR, and KAGAN, JJ., dissenting 

mostly does not even grant certiorari on one-year-old, one-
to-one Circuit splits, because we know that a bit of disagree-
ment is an inevitable part of our legal system.  To borrow 
an old saying that might apply here: Not one or even a cou-
ple of swallows can make the majority’s summer. 

Anyone concerned about workability should consider the 
majority’s  substitute  standard.    The  majority  says  a  law 
regulating or banning abortion “must be sustained if there
is  a  rational  basis  on  which  the  legislature  could  have
thought  that  it  would  serve  legitimate  state  interests.” 
Ante, at 77.  And the majority lists interests like “respect
for and preservation of prenatal life,” “protection of mater-
nal  health,”  elimination  of  certain  “medical  procedures,” 
“mitigation  of  fetal  pain,”  and  others.    Ante,  at  78.  This 
Court will surely face critical questions about how that test 
applies.  Must a state law allow abortions when necessary
to  protect  a  woman’s  life  and  health?  And  if  so,  exactly 
when?  How much risk to a woman’s life can a State force 
—————— 
pressive.  The majority says that lower courts have split over how to ap-
ply the undue burden standard to parental notification laws.  See ante, 
at 60, and n. 54.  But that is not so.  The state law upheld had an exemp-
tion  for  minors  demonstrating  adequate  maturity,  whereas  the  ones
struck  down  did  not.  Compare  Planned  Parenthood  of  Blue  Ridge  v. 
Camblos, 155 F. 3d 352, 383–384 (CA4 1998), with Planned Parenthood 
of Ind. & Ky., Inc. v. Adams, 937 F. 3d 973, 981 (CA7 2019), cert. granted, 
judgment vacated, 591 U. S. ___ (2020), and Planned Parenthood, Sioux 
Falls Clinic v. Miller, 63 F. 3d 1452, 1460 (CA8 1995).  The majority says 
there is a split about bans on certain types of abortion procedures.  See 
ante, at 61, and n. 55.  But the one court to have separated itself on that
issue did so based on a set of factual findings significantly different from 
those  in  other  cases.  Compare  Whole  Woman’s  Health  v.  Paxton,  10 
F. 4th  430,  447–453  (CA5  2021),  with  EMW  Women’s  Surgical  Center, 
P.S.C. v. Friedlander, 960 F. 3d 785, 798–806 (CA6 2020), and West Ala. 
Women’s Center v. Williamson, 900 F. 3d 1310, 1322–1324 (CA11 2018). 
Finally, the majority says there is a split about whether an increase in 
travel time  to reach a clinic is an undue burden.  See ante, at 61, and 
n. 56.    But  the  cases  to  which  the  majority  refers  predate  this  Court’s 
decision in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, 579 U. S. 582 (2016), 
which clarified how to apply the undue burden standard to that context.