Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23-235_n7ip.pdf
Page Number: 19.0

Cite as:  602 U. S. ____ (2024) 

15 

Opinion of the Court 

required to perform abortions or to provide other treatment 
that  violates  their  consciences.  See  42  U. S. C.  §300a–
7(c)(1); see also H. R. 4366, 118th Cong., 2d Sess., Div. C,
Title  II,  §203  (2024).  The  Church  Amendments,  for 
instance,  speak  clearly.    They  allow  doctors  and  other
healthcare  personnel  to  “refus[e]  to  perform  or  assist”  an
abortion without punishment or discrimination from their
employers.    42  U. S. C.  §300a–7(c)(1).    And  the  Church 
Amendments more broadly provide that doctors shall not be 
required  to  provide  treatment  or  assistance  that  would 
violate  the  doctors’  religious  beliefs  or  moral  convictions. 
§300a–7(d).  Most if not all States have conscience laws to 
the  same  effect.  See  N.  Sawicki,  Protections  From  Civil 
Liability  in  State  Abortion  Conscience  Laws,  322  JAMA
1918 (2019); see, e.g., Tex. Occ. Code Ann. §103.001 (West 
2022).

Moreover,  as  the  Government  notes,  federal  conscience 
protections  encompass  “the  doctor’s  beliefs  rather  than 
particular  procedures,”  meaning  that  doctors  cannot  be 
required  to  treat  mifepristone  complications  in  any  way 
that would violate the doctors’ consciences.  Tr. of Oral Arg. 
37; see §300a–7(c)(1).  As the Government points out, that 
strong protection for conscience remains true even in a so-
called  healthcare  desert,  where  other  doctors  are  not 
readily available.  Tr. of Oral Arg. 18. 

Not only as a matter of law but also as a matter of fact,
the federal conscience laws have protected pro-life doctors 
ever  since  FDA  approved  mifepristone  in  2000.  The 
plaintiffs have not identified any instances where a doctor 
was  required,  notwithstanding  conscience  objections,  to 
perform  an  abortion  or  to  provide  other  abortion-related 
treatment  that  violated  the  doctor’s  conscience.  Nor  is 
there any evidence in the record here of hospitals overriding
or failing to accommodate doctors’ conscience objections.

In  other  words,  none  of  the  doctors’  declarations  says
anything  like  the  following:    “Here  is  the  treatment  I