As the Supreme Court opens its new term, it appears likely that abortion will be on the docket for the first time since 2007, when the Court upheld the federal ban on partial-birth abortion. The most significant case that the Supreme Court will likely accept involves a Texas law that, on Thursday, the Fifth Circuit allowed to go into immediate effect. It requires abortion clinics to meet the same health and safety standards that apply to ambulatory surgical centers.
Abortion advocates have vowed to take their opposition to the Supreme Court, where their case will join several other abortion cases competing for the Court’s attention. Cases challenging state regulations on admitting requirements and on abortion drugs such as RU-486 will also likely find their way onto the Court’s docket.
The Texas case presents the Supreme Court with its first opportunity in more than a decade to decide the constitutionality of state laws prescribing minimum health, safety, and operating standards for abortion clinics. In 2001 and again in 2003, the Court declined to hear cases challenging South Carolina’s comprehensive abortion-clinic regulations.
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