| June Medical Services, LLC v. Russo | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued March 4, 2020 Decided June 29, 2020 | |
| Full case name | June Medical Services, LLC, et al. v. Stephen Russo, Interim Secretary, Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals |
| Docket no. | 18-1323 |
| Citations | 591 U.S. ___ (more) 2020 WL 3492640 |
| Argument | Oral argument |
| Decision | Opinion |
| Case history | |
| Prior |
|
| Holding | |
| The Louisiana law requiring abortion doctors to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinic imposes an undue burden on a woman's right to obtain an abortion. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinions | |
| Plurality | Breyer, joined by Ginsburg, Sotomayor, Kagan |
| Concurrence | Roberts (in judgment) |
| Dissent | Thomas |
| Dissent | Alito, joined by Gorsuch; Thomas (except Parts III–C and IV–F); Kavanaugh (Parts I, II, and III) |
| Dissent | Gorsuch |
| Dissent | Kavanaugh |
| Laws applied | |
| Louisiana Unsafe Abortion Protection Act | |
Superseded by | |
| Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization (2022) | |
June Medical Services, LLC v. Russo, 591 U.S. ___ (2020), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court ruled that a Louisiana state law placing hospital-admission requirements on abortion clinics doctors was unconstitutional. The law mirrored a Texas state law that the Court found unconstitutional in 2016 in Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt (WWH).
The Louisiana state law, as the Texas law, would have required doctors performing abortions to have admission privileges at a state-authorized hospital within 30 miles (48 km) of the abortion clinic. This law would have limited abortions to one single doctor in the state, as other doctors had not yet gained admission privileges or were outside the given range. The Texas law was declared unconstitutional in WWH in 2016,[1] on the basis that limiting clinic availability was an undue burden on women seeking legal abortions, a constitutional right as determined by the landmark ruling Roe v. Wade (1973).[2] The Louisiana law, however, had survived its challenge on appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, which ruled the law had fundamental differences from the Texas law based on the WWH ruling.
On June 29, 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in a 5–4 decision that the Louisiana law was unconstitutional, reversing the Fifth Circuit's decision.[3] The Court's plurality opinion was written by Justice Stephen Breyer and joined by the three more liberal members of the Court, asserting that Louisiana's law was unconstitutional following from the same arguments that Texas's law had been in WWH and overruling the Fifth Circuit's reasoning. Chief Justice John Roberts joined them in the judgement but not in the opinion, upholding his position of dissent from WWH but deferring to a matter of precedent to support the judgement. The remaining four Justices submitted their own dissents upholding the law's constitutionality.
June Medical Services had been considered a potentially important case on abortion rights in the United States, as it was the first abortion-related case to be heard by both Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, two justices that are considered conservative, giving the Court a conservative majority, and potentially threatening the Roe v. Wade precedent.[4]
- ^ Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, No. 15-274, 579 U.S. ___ (2016).
- ^ Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973).
- ^ June Medical Services, LLC v. Russo, No. 18-1323, 591 U.S. ___ (2020).
- ^ Allsbrook, Jamille Fields; Ellmann, Nora (February 6, 2020). "June Medical Services v. Russo". Center for American Progress. Retrieved December 5, 2020.