Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt

Texas required abortion doctors to have hospital admitting privileges within 30 miles and required abortion facilities to meet ambulatory-surgical-center standards. Whole Woman's Health (plaintiff) sued the state health commissioner, Hellerstedt (defendant), arguing the laws were unconstitutional. The district court found the laws would cut the number of Texas abortion facilities from about 40 to seven or eight, would especially burden rural women, and were not justified by any real safety need, since abortion was already safe and surgical centers were not shown to be appreciably safer; it struck down both laws, but the court of appeals reversed, and the Supreme Court granted certiorari.

Whether a law that has the purpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion imposes an unconstitutional undue burden on her right to obtain one.