Supreme Court blocks enforcement of Texas anti-abortion law

Richard Wolf | USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday blocked Texas from enforcing tough new restrictions on abortion providers that would have forced many clinics to close and made abortions harder to obtain.

The order delays implementation of a law requiring doctors performing abortions to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals and requiring clinics to have facilities equal to surgical centers. Opponents of the law said a state that once had 41 abortion clinics would be reduced to having only nine.

The decision proved as divisive for the court as all the others it reached Monday on the 2014 term's final day. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito said they would have denied the stay application from abortion proponents.

As a result of the action, clinics that could have been forced to close can remain in business while the high court decides whether to hear abortion proponents' appeal from a circuit court ruling that upheld the law. If the court ultimately refuses to hear the case in the fall, the order blocking enforcement will expire.

The Texas law is one of many passed by Republican state legislatures in recent years that test the limits of abortion restrictions. While the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalized abortions, the 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision and others since then have upheld many restrictions, including a ban on late-term abortions.

Given that five justices apparently agreed to block enforcing the Texas law, it's increasingly likely that the court will agree to hear the case or another pending from Mississippi. That would add the explosive issue of abortion to the court's 2015 docket.

Texas lawmakers and anti-abortion activists claim the law is intended to make abortion clinics and procedures safer without forcing women to travel too far for services. All the state's major metropolitan centers still would have at least one operating clinic, they say.

"By actively lobbying against common sense regulations that would make sure women have access to 'safe, legal and rare' abortions, Planned Parenthood and their allies are making a mockery of women's health care," said Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America.

Critics say the tougher standards are intended to make if more difficult to obtain an abortion.

"The justices have preserved Texas women's few remaining options for safe and legal abortion care for the moment," said Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, which is representing the Texas clinics in the lawsuit. "Now it's time to put a stop to these clinic shutdown laws once and for all."



