Court reaffirms Roe but upholds restrictions

By a 5-4 margin, the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed on June 29, 1992, "the essential holding in Roe v. Wade" that prior to fetal viability, a woman has a constitutional right to obtain an abortion. After viability, a state may prohibit abortion, but only if it provides exceptions for endangerment to the woman's life or health. The Court said that both the intimate nature of the decision to terminate a pregnancy and the Court's obligation to follow precedent required it to uphold Roe's central holding. At the same time, however, the Court discarded Roe's trimester framework that severely restricted a state's power to regulate abortion in the early stages of pregnancy, saying that the trimester framework "undervalues" the state's interest in potential life, which exists throughout pregnancy. The Court also adopted a more lenient standard for analyzing the constitutionality of abortion restrictions than was permitted under Roe. It said a state may regulate abortion throughout pregnancy, as long as it does not impose an "undue burden" on a woman's right to terminate her pregnancy. The Court defined "undue burden" as a regulation that "has the purpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion of a nonviable fetus." Under Roe, the right to abortion was deemed "fundamental" and could not be restricted unless the state could show a "compelling" interest in doing so.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)