922
Opinion of Blackmun, J.
tion required by the statute be justified as relevant to any "philosophic" or "social" argument, ante, at 872, either favoring or disfavoring the abortion decision in a particular case. In light of all of these facts, I conclude that the information requirements in § 3205(a)(1)(ii) and §§ 3205(a)(2)(i)-(iii) do not serve a useful purpose and thus constitute an unnecessary— and therefore undue—burden on the woman's constitutional liberty to decide to terminate her pregnancy.
Accordingly, while I disagree with Parts IV, V-B, and V-D of the joint opinion,8 I join the remainder of the Court's opinion.
Justice Blackmun, concurring in part, concurring in the judgment in part, and dissenting in part.
I join Parts I, II, III, V-A, V-C, and VI of the joint opinion of Justices O'Connor, Kennedy, and Souter, ante.
Three years ago, in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, 492 U. S. 490 (1989), four Members of this Court appeared poised to "cas[t] into darkness the hopes and visions of every woman in this country" who had come to believe that the Constitution guaranteed her the right to reproductive choice. Id., at 557 (Blackmun, J., dissenting). See id., at 499 (plurality opinion of Rehnquist, C. J., joined by White and Kennedy, JJ.); id., at 532 (Scalia, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment). All that remained between the promise of Roe and the darkness of the plurality was a single, flickering flame. Decisions since Webster gave little reason to hope that this flame would cast much light. See, e. g., Ohio v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, 497 U. S. 502, 524 (1990) (Blackmun, J., dissenting). But now, just when so many expected the darkness to fall, the flame has grown bright.
8 Although I agree that a parental-consent requirement (with the appropriate bypass) is constitutional, I do not join Part V-D of the joint opinion because its approval of Pennsylvania's informed parental-consent requirement is based on the reasons given in Part V-B, with which I disagree.
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