Document Text |
Summary |
| Hyde Amendment | |
| Prohibits using funds appropriated by this Act to perform abortions except where the life of the mother would be endangered if the fetus were carried to term. | Government funds cannot be used for abortions unless the life of the mother is in danger. |
Hyde Amendment
U.S. Congress. “H.R.14232 – 94th Congress (1975-1976): An Act making appropriations for the Departments of Labor, and Health, Education, and Welfare, and related agencies, for the fiscal year ending September 30, 1977, and for other purposes.” September 30, 1976.
Document Text |
Summary |
| Planned Parenthood v. Casey | |
| JUSTICE O’CONNOR, JUSTICE KENNEDY, and JUSTICE SOUTER concluded in Part IV that an examination of Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113, and subsequent cases, reveals a number of guiding principles that should control the assessment of the Pennsylvania statute: | Justices O’Connor, Kennedy, and Souter made the following decision regarding abortion rights. |
| (a) To protect the central right recognized by Roe while at the same time accommodating the State’s profound interest in potential life, see id., at 162, the undue burden standard should be employed. An undue burden exists, and therefore a provision of law is invalid, if its purpose or effect is to place substantial obstacles in the path of a woman seeking an abortion before the fetus attains viability. | The right to an abortion should stay but we also recognize that the state of Pennsylvania has an interest in protecting potential life. The state is therefore allowed to pass restrictions on abortions. These restrictions cannot make it too difficult for a woman to obtain an abortion. |
| (b) Roe‘s rigid trimester framework is rejected. To promote the State’s interest in potential life throughout pregnancy, the State may take measures to ensure that the woman’s choice is informed. Measures designed to advance this interest should not be invalidated if their purpose is to persuade the woman to choose childbirth over abortion. These measures must not be an undue burden on the right. | The state is allowed to pass laws to make sure women have all the information they need to make a decision about having an abortion. But they cannot try to persuade a woman not to have an abortion. |
| (c) As with any medical procedure, the State may enact regulations to further the health or safety of a woman seeking an abortion, but may not impose unnecessary health regulations that present a substantial obstacle to a woman seeking an abortion. | The state is allowed to pass regulations to protect the health of women seeking abortions. They cannot pass unnecessary health measures to make it difficult for women to have an abortion. |
| (d) Adoption of the undue burden standard does not disturb Roe‘s holding that regardless of whether exceptions are made for particular circumstances, a State may not prohibit any woman from making the ultimate decision to terminate her pregnancy before viability. | This new standard of “undue burden” does not mean that states can make abortion illegal. |
| (e) Roe‘s holding that “subsequent to viability, the State in promoting its interest in the potentiality of human life may, if it chooses, regulate, and even proscribe, abortion except where it is necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or health of the mother” is also reaffirmed. | As decided in Roe v. Wade, the government cannot place restrictions on abortions that are medically necessary to protect the life or health of the mother. |
Planned Parenthood v. Casey.
Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 1992. Cornell Law School.
Background
The pro-choice movement won a significant victory when the Supreme Court’s ruling in Roe v. Wade guaranteed the right to an abortion in 1973. Before 1973, experts estimate that anywhere between 200,000 and 1.2 million illegal abortions took place annually, and around 200 women died from abortions annually. Experts estimate that by 1985, only eight American women died annually from having an abortion.
The Roe v. Wade decision reenergized antiabortion activists, who believed that it ignored the rights of the fetus, often referred to as “right to life.” The antiabortion movement adopted a strategy that aimed to end abortions in the United States step-by-step. They thought this approach would be more likely to succeed than attempting to make it illegal on the federal level. For example, they pushed local and state governments to restrict public funding of the procedure.
The emergence of the Religious Right in the late 1970s and the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan encouraged antiabortion activists to align with the Republican Party. In the decades to follow, the momentum built around this issue in the 1980s played a major role in the election of Republican candidates at the local, state, and federal levels.
The Supreme Court upheld the decision in Roe v. Wade for nearly 50 years. In 2022, it overturned the ruling in the decision of Dobbs. v. Jackson, eliminating the constitutional right to an abortion.
About the Document
The Hyde Amendment was named for Representative Henry Hyde (R-IL). An addition to a funding bill in 1976, the amendment banned the use of federal funds to pay for abortions except in cases where the mother’s life was in danger. Opponents of the measure argued that the Hyde Amendment discriminated against the poor because it eliminated funding for Americans on Medicaid. Federal funds paid for an estimated 300,000 abortions every year until the ban took effect in 1980.
In 1992, the Supreme Court reaffirmed the Roe decision in their ruling of Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey. Several abortion clinics had challenged new laws passed in Pennsylvania, which placed additional restrictions on women seeking the procedure. While the Supreme Court upheld abortion rights, it also introduced the standard of “undue burden.” This meant that states could pass laws that restricted access to abortions as long as they did not make it substantially difficult for a woman to obtain one.
Vocabulary
- abortion: A procedure to end a pregnancy.
- amendment: A change or addition to a law.
- pro-life: The belief that women should not have the right to end a pregnancy.
- pro-choice: The belief that women have the right to end a pregnancy.
- Medicaid: Government program that helps low-income Americans with health-care costs.
- Planned Parenthood: Nonprofit organization that provides reproductive health care, including abortion.
- proscribe: To forbid something.
- Religious Right: A political movement in the United States that advocates for social and political conservatism. Their beliefs are rooted in Christianity.
- subsequent: The following.
- Supreme Court: The highest court in the United States.
- terminate: To end something.
- trimester: A period of three months in a pregnancy, which has three trimesters.
- undue burden: Something that creates a significant difficulty or cost.
- viability: The ability to survive.
Discussion Questions
- How did the Hyde Amendment and Planned Parenthood v. Casey restrict women’s access to abortion?
- How did the Supreme Court justify their decision to allow states to place more restrictions on abortions?
- Why did the justices introduce the idea of “undue burden”? How does that decision reflect on Roe v. Wade?
- What do the Hyde Amendment and Planned Parenthood v. Casey say about the history of abortion laws in the United States?
Suggested Activities
- APUSH Connection: 9.2: Reagan and Conservatism
- AP Government Connections:
- 3.7: Selective incorporation
- 3.9: Due process and the right to privacy
- 3.10: Social movements and equal protection
- 3.11: Government responses to social movements
- Use this resource to help students understand the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson.
- Pair these documents with the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade and discuss the history of abortion rights in the 20th century.
- Combine this resource with the life story of Byllye Avery. What impacts did women’s access to reproductive health care have on her career?
- Consider the government’s increasing limitations on aid for lower-income families by pairing the Hyde Amendment with an advertisement to support government aid for families.
- Read the life story of Sandra Day O’Connor, one of the three justices who authored the Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision.
- Explore activism on the political right by teaching these documents alongside photographs of anti-LGBTQ+ activism and the life story of Beverly LaHaye.
Themes
ACTIVISM AND SOCIAL CHANGE; POWER AND POLITICS; SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, AND MEDICINE
