ABSTRACT
In a ringing dissent to Thornburgh, Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and William H. Rehnquist insisted that the Court had distorted its constitutional jurisdiction. O'Connor and Rehnquist contended that Thornburgh made it "painfully clear that no legal rule or doctrine is safe from ad hoc nullification by the Court when an occasion for its implementation arises in a case involving state regulation of abortion." In a complete reversal of Thornburgh, six years later in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 US 833, the Supreme Court upheld the provisions it had rejected in 1986 except for the spousal- notification provision. The Pennsylvania law contained an informed- consent provision that required any woman wishing to obtain an abortion to be given information geared toward convincing her that she should continue the pregnancy. The Pennsylvania law enforced mandatory counseling and a waiting period before an abortion could be obtained.
