972
Per Curiam
The Court of Appeals never contested this District Court conclusion that there was "insufficient evidence" in the record that the requirement posed a " 'substantial obstacle to a woman seeking an abortion.' " Instead, it held that the physician-only requirement was arguably invalid because its purpose, according to the Court of Appeals, may have been to create a substantial obstacle to women seeking abortions. 94 F. 3d, at 567. But even assuming the correctness of the Court of Appeals' implicit premise—that a legislative purpose to interfere with the constitutionally protected right to abortion without the effect of interfering with that right (here it is uncontested that there was insufficient evidence of a "substantial obstacle" to abortion) could render the Montana law invalid—there is no basis for finding a vitiating legislative purpose here. We do not assume unconstitutional legislative intent even when statutes produce harmful results, see, e. g., Washington v. Davis, 426 U. S. 229, 246 (1976); much less do we assume it when the results are harmless. One searches the Court of Appeals' opinion in vain for any mention of any evidence suggesting an unlawful motive on the part of the Montana Legislature. If the motion at issue here were a defendant's motion for summary judgment, and if the plaintiff's only basis for proceeding with the suit were a claim of improper legislative purpose, one would demand some evidence of that improper purpose in order to avoid a nonsuit. And what is at issue here is not even a defendant's motion for summary judgment, but a plaintiff's motion for preliminary injunctive relief, as to which the requirement for substantial proof is much higher. "It frequently is observed that a preliminary injunction is an extraordinary and drastic remedy, one that should not be granted unless the movant, by a clear showing, carries the burden of persuasion." 11A C. Wright, A. Miller, & M. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2948, pp. 129-130 (2d ed. 1995) (emphasis added; footnotes omitted).
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