Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/505/833/
Timestamp: 2017-10-17 20:18:30
Document Index: 676291180

Matched Legal Cases: ['sui generis', '§ 3209', '§ 3205', 'sui generis', '§ 3207', '§ 3214']

Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey :: 505 U.S. 833 (1992) :: Justia US Supreme Court Center
Justia › US Law › US Case Law › US Supreme Court › Volume 505 › Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey › Syllabus
*Together with No. 91-902, Casey, Governor of Pennsylvania, et al. v. Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania et al., also on certiorari to the same court.
(e) The Roe rule's limitation on state power could not be repudiated without serious inequity to people who, for two decades of economic and social developments, have organized intimate relationships and made choices that define their views of themselves and their places in society, in reliance on the availability of abortion in the event that contraception should fail. The ability of women to participate equally in the economic and social life of the Nation has been facilitated by their ability to control their reproductive lives. The Constitution serves human values, and while the effect of reliance on Roe cannot be exactly measured, neither can the certain costs of overruling Roe for people who have ordered their thinking and living around that case be dismissed. Pp.855-856.
(f) No evolution of legal principle has left Roe's central rule a doctrinal anachronism discounted by society. If Roe is placed among the cases exemplified by Griswold, supra, it is clearly in no jeopardy, since subsequent constitutional developments have neither disturbed, nor do they threaten to diminish, the liberty recognized in such cases. Similarly, if Roe is seen as stating a rule of personal autonomy and bodily integrity, akin to cases recognizing limits on governmental power to mandate medical treatment or to bar its rejection, this Court's post-Roe decisions accord with Roe's view that a State's interest in the protection of life falls short of justifying any plenary override of individual liberty claims. See, e. g., Cruzan v. Director, Mo. Dept. of Health, 497 U. S. 261, 278. Finally, if Roe is classified as sui generis, there clearly has been no erosion of its central determination. It was expressly reaffirmed in Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, Inc., 462 U. S. 416 (Akron I), and Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, 476 U. S. 747; and, in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, 492 U. S. 490, a majority either voted to reaffirm or declined to address the constitutional validity of Roe's central holding. pp. 857-859.
(g) No change in Roe's factual underpinning has left its central holding obsolete, and none supports an argument for its overruling. Although subsequent maternal health care advances allow for later abortions safe to the pregnant woman, and post-Roe neonatal care developments have advanced viability to a point somewhat earlier, these facts go only to the scheme of time limits on the realization of competing interests. Thus, any later divergences from the factual premises of Roe have no bearing on the validity of its central holding, that viability marks the earliest point at which the State's interest in fetal
life is constitutionally adequate to justify a legislative ban on nontherapeutic abortions. The soundness or unsoundness of that constitutional judgment in no sense turns on when viability occurs. Whenever it may occur, its attainment will continue to serve as the critical fact. P.860.
(h) A comparison between Roe and two decisional lines of comparable significance-the line identified with Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45, and the line that began with Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U. S. 537-confirms the result reached here. Those lines were overruled-by, respectively, West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, 300 U. S. 379, and Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483-on the basis of facts, or an understanding of facts, changed from those which furnished the claimed justifications for the earlier constitutional resolutions. The overruling decisions were comprehensible to the Nation, and defensible, as the Court's responses to changed circumstances. In contrast, because neither the factual underpinnings of Roe's central holding nor this Court's understanding of it has changed (and because no other indication of weakened precedent has been shown), the Court could not pretend to be reexamining Roe with any justification beyond a present doctrinal disposition to come out differently from the Roe Court. That is an inadequate basis for overruling a prior case. Pp.861-864.
(i) Overruling Roe's central holding would not only reach an unjustifiable result under stare decisis principles, but would seriously weaken the Court's capacity to exercise the judicial power and to function as the Supreme Court of a Nation dedicated to the rule of law. Where the Court acts to resolve the sort of unique, intensely divisive controversy reflected in Roe, its decision has a dimension not present in normal cases and is entitled to rare precedential force to counter the inevitable efforts to overturn it and to thwart its implementation. Only the most convincing justification under accepted standards of precedent could suffice to demonstrate that a later decision overruling the first was anything but a surrender to political pressure and an unjustified repudiation of the principle on which the Court staked its authority in the first instance. Moreover, the country's loss of confidence in the Judiciary would be underscored by condemnation for the Court's failure to keep faith with those who support the decision at a cost to themselves. A decision to overrule Roe's essential holding under the existing circumstances would address error, if error there was, at the cost of both profound and unnecessary damage to the Court's legitimacy and to the N ation's commitment to the rule of law. Pp. 864-869.
JUSTICE O'CONNOR, JUSTICE KENNEDY, and JUSTICE SOUTER concluded in Part IV that an examination of Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113, and
(e) Roe's holding that "subsequent to viability, the State in promoting its interest in the potentiality of human life may, if it chooses, regulate, and even proscribe, abortion except where it is necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or health of the mother" is also reaffirmed. Id., at 164-165. Pp.869-879.
2. Section 3209's husband notification provision constitutes an undue burden and is therefore invalid. A significant number of women will likely be prevented from obtaining an abortion just as surely as if Pennsylvania had outlawed the procedure entirely. The fact that § 3209 may affect fewer than one percent of women seeking abortions does not save it from facial invalidity, since the proper focus of constitutional inquiry
is the group for whom the law is a restriction, not the group for whom it is irrelevant. Furthermore, it cannot be claimed that the father's interest in the fetus' welfare is equal to the mother's protected liberty, since it is an inescapable biological fact that state regulation with respect to the fetus will have a far greater impact on the pregnant woman's bodily integrity than it will on the husband. Section 3209 embodies a view of marriage consonant with the common-law status of married women but repugnant to this Court's present understanding of marriage and of the nature of the rights secured by the Constitution. See Planned Parenthood of Central Mo. v. Danforth, 428 U. S. 52, 69. Pp.887-898.
1. Section 3205's informed consent provision is not an undue burden on a woman's constitutional right to decide to terminate a pregnancy. To the extent Akron I, 462 U. S., at 444, and Thornburgh, 476 U. S., at 762, find a constitutional violation when the government requires, as it does here, the giving of truthful, nonmisleading information about the nature of the abortion procedure, the attendant health risks and those of childbirth, and the "probable gestational age" of the fetus, those cases are inconsistent with Roe's acknowledgment of an important interest in potential life, and are overruled. Requiring that the woman be informed of the availability of information relating to the consequences to the fetus does not interfere with a constitutional right of privacy between a pregnant woman and her physician, since the doctor-patient relation is derivative of the woman's position, and does not underlie or override the abortion right. Moreover, the physician's First Amendment rights not to speak are implicated only as part of the practice of medicine, which is licensed and regulated by the State. There is no evidence here that requiring a doctor to give the required information would amount to a substantial obstacle to a woman seeking an abortion. The premise behind Akron I's invalidation of a waiting period between the provision of the information deemed necessary to informed consent and the performance of an abortion, 462 U. S., at 450, is also wrong. Although § 3205's 24-hour waiting period may make some abortions more expensive and less convenient, it cannot be said that it is invalid
1. Although Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113, is not directly implicated by the Pennsylvania statute, which simply regulates and does not prohibit abortion, a reexamination of the "fundamental right" Roe accorded to a woman's decision to abort a fetus, with the concomitant requirement that any state regulation of abortion survive "strict scrutiny," id., at 154-156, is warranted by the confusing and uncertain state of this Court's post-Roe decisional law. A review of post-Roe cases demonstrates both that they have expanded upon Roe in imposing increasingly greater restrictions on the States, see Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, 476 U. S. 747, 783 (Burger, C. J., dissenting), and that the Court has become increasingly more divided, none of the last three such decisions having commanded a majority opinion, see Ohio v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, 497 U. S. 502; Hodgson v. Minnesota, 497 U. S. 417; Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, 492 U. S. 490. This confusion and uncertainty complicated the task of the Court of Appeals, which concluded that the "undue burden" standard adopted by JUSTICE O'CONNOR in Webster and Hodgson governs the present cases. Pp. 944-951.
2. The Roe Court reached too far when it analogized the right to abort a fetus to the rights involved in Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510; Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390; Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1; and Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479, and thereby deemed the right to abortion to be "fundamental." None of these decisions endorsed an all-encompassing "right of privacy," as Roe, supra, at 152-153, claimed. Because abortion involves the purposeful termination of potential life, the abortion decision must be recognized as sui generis, different in kind from the rights protected in the earlier cases under the rubric of personal or family privacy and autonomy. And the historical traditions of the American people-as evidenced by the English common
law and by the American abortion statutes in existence both at the time of the Fourteenth Amendment's adoption and Roe's issuance-do not support the view that the right to terminate one's pregnancy is "fundamental." Thus, enactments abridging that right need not be subjected to strict scrutiny. Pp. 951-953.
5. Section 3205's requirements are rationally related to the State's legitimate interest in assuring that a woman's consent to an abortion be fully informed. The requirement that a physician disclose certain information about the abortion procedure and its risks and alternatives is not a large burden and is clearly related to maternal health and the State's interest in informed consent. In addition, a State may rationally decide that physicians are better qualified than counselors to impart this information and answer questions about the abortion alternatives' medical aspects. The requirement that information be provided about the availability of paternal child support and state-funded alternatives is also related to the State's informed consent interest and furthers the State's interest in preserving unborn life. That such information might create some uncertainty and persuade some women to forgo abortions only demonstrates that it might make a difference and is therefore relevant to a woman's informed choice. In light of this plurality's rejection of Roe's "fundamental right" approach to this subject, the Court's contrary holding in Thornburgh is not controlling here. For the same reason, this Court's previous holding invalidating a State's 24-hour mandatory waiting period should not be followed. The waiting period helps ensure that a woman's decision to abort is a well-considered one, and rationally furthers the State's legitimate interest in maternal health and
7. Section 3214(a)'s requirement that abortion facilities file a report on each abortion is constitutional because it rationally furthers the State's legitimate interests in advancing the state of medical knowledge concerning maternal health and prenatal life, in gathering statistical information with respect to patients, and in ensuring compliance with other provisions of the Act, while keeping the reports completely confidential. Public disclosure of other reports made by facilities receiving public funds-those identifying the facilities and any parent, subsidiary, or affiliated organizations, § 3207(b), and those revealing the total number of abortions performed, broken down by trimester, § 3214(f)-are rationally related to the State's legitimate interest in informing taxpayers as to who is benefiting from public funds and what services the funds are supporting; and records relating to the expenditure of public funds are generally available to the public under Pennsylvania law. Pp. 976-977.
O'CONNOR, KENNEDY, and SOUTER, JJ., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, II, III, V-A, V-C, and VI, in which BLACKMUN and STEVENS, JJ., joined, an opinion with respect to Part V-E, in which STEVENS, J., joined, and an opinion with respect to Parts IV, V-B, and V-Do STEVENS, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part, post, p. 911. BLACKMUN, J., filed an opinion concurring in part, concurring in the judgment in part, and dissenting in part, post, p. 922. REHNQUIST, C. J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment in part and dissenting in part, in which
WHITE, SCALIA, and THOMAS, JJ., joined, post, p. 944. SCALIA, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment in part and dissenting in part, in which REHNQUIST, C. J., and WHITE and THOMAS, JJ., joined, post, p. 979.
A person retains the right to have an abortion, established by Roe v. Wade, but the state’s compelling interest in protecting the life of an unborn child means that it can ban an abortion of a viable fetus under any circumstances except when the health of the mother is at risk. Also, laws restricting abortion should be evaluated under an undue burden standard rather than a strict scrutiny analysis.
The Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act of 1982 contained five controversial provisions: 1) doctors were required to inform women considering abortion about its potential negative impacts on their health; 2) women were required to give notice to husbands before obtaining an abortion; 3) children were required to get consent from a parent or guardian; 4) a 24-hour waiting period was required between deciding to have an abortion and undergoing the procedure; and 5) reporting requirements were imposed on facilities offering abortions.
An independent physician, a group of physicians providing abortion services, and five abortion clinics in Pennsylvania filed a lawsuit in federal district court seeking to enjoin enforcement of these provisions of the law on the grounds that they were facially unconstitutional. The district court agreed and issued the injunction, but the Third Circuit upheld all of the provisions except the second provision requiring women to give notice to their husbands. (Current Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito was on the Third Circuit at the time and felt that all of the provisions should have been upheld.)
This challenge to the right of abortion provided by Roe v. Wade and based on the Fourteenth Amendment was viewed as an opportunity for a more conservative Court to overturn Roe. New Justices David Souter and Clarence Thomas had been appointed by Republican President George H.W. Bush and thus were considered to be less liberal than recently retired Democratic appointees William Brennan and Thurgood Marshall. With eight Republican appointees and only two Justices who previously had shown support for Roe, the odds were stacked against pro-choice advocates at the outset.
Judgment for plaintiffs. An injunction against the five challenged provisions of the law is appropriate because they are facially unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment.
US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit - 947 F. 2d 682 (3d Cir. 1991)
Affirmed in part and reversed in part. The provisions other than the husband notification requirement are not unconstitutional, but that provision places an undue burden on women who suffer from domestic violence by their husbands.
Kathryn Kolbert (plaintiffs)
Linda J. Wharton (plaintiffs)
Ernie Preate (defendants)
Issue: Whether the decision in Roe v. Wade should be overturned as wrongly decided.
The plurality rejected the call to overturn Roe v. Wade that the state had advanced on appeal, although it reshaped some of Roe's guidelines. It emphasized the importance of adhering to precedents unless a dramatic change in the area of the previous decision had happened, and it reaffirmed the existence of a constitutional right to abortion. In this case, O'Connor did not feel that society had developed a concurrence against abortion similar to the concurrence against separate-but-equal education that resulted in Brown v. Board of Education overruling Plessy v. Ferguson. Blackmun and Stevens agreed with this section of the opinion, giving it the necessary five votes for Roe to survive.
Replacing the trimester formula in Roe with an emphasis on viability, the plurality found that a fetus could become viable earlier than when Roe was decided, and it held that a state could ban abortion once a fetus becomes viable unless the health of the mother was at risk. Its other notable revision of Roe was its replacement of strict scrutiny with an undue burden standard that was more lenient to the state. O'Connor built on her dissenting opinion from the Court's 1983 decision in Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health in holding that restrictions on abortion before the fetus was viable were constitutional unless they posed a substantial obstacle to the woman seeking an abortion.
As a result, the plurality invalidated the husband notice requirement for reasons similar to those stated by the Third Circuit. It upheld the other provisions of the law.
Stevens agreed with the portion of the majority opinion that upheld Roe but would have overruled all of the challenged provisions of the law.
Blackmun largely agreed with Stevens in applying a heightened standard of review and finding that all of the provisions were unconstitutional under it.
Rehnquist would have upheld all of the provisions, including the husband notice requirement, and also overruled Roe. He pointed out the inconsistencies in the majority's stated respect for precedent and its substantial reshaping of the Roe framework.
Scalia agreed with Rehnquist that the Court should have used this opportunity to overrule Roe entirely. He also would have upheld the constitutionality of all the provisions.
This case was a descendant of the Roe v. Wade line of decisions, but it replaced the trimester framework with a focus on viability in determining when the state's interests could outweigh the interests of a pregnant woman. The addition of the undue burden standard tilted the balance in the state's favor when making these determinations, however. Since the Court was so deeply divided, the door remained open to future challenges to Roe.
A person retains the right to have an abortion, established by Roe v. Wade, but the state’s compelli...
The Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act of 1982 contained five controversial provisions: 1) doctors w...