Cite as: 505 U. S. 833 (1992)
Opinion of Scalia, J.
thors of the joint opinion. The shortcomings of Roe did not include lack of clarity: Virtually all regulation of abortion before the third trimester was invalid. But to come across this phrase in the joint opinion—which calls upon federal district judges to apply an "undue burden" standard as doubtful in application as it is unprincipled in origin—is really more than one should have to bear.
The joint opinion frankly concedes that the amorphous concept of "undue burden" has been inconsistently applied by the Members of this Court in the few brief years since that "test" was first explicitly propounded by Justice O'Connor in her dissent in Akron I, 462 U. S. 416 (1983). See ante, at 876.3 Because the three Justices now wish to "set forth a standard of general application," the joint opinion announces that "it is important to clarify what is meant by an undue burden." Ibid. I certainly agree with that, but I do not agree that the joint opinion succeeds in the announced endeavor. To the contrary, its efforts at clarifica-3 The joint opinion is clearly wrong in asserting, ante, at 874, that "the Court's early abortion cases adhered to" the "undue burden" standard. The passing use of that phrase in Justice Blackmun's opinion for the Court in Bellotti v. Baird, 428 U. S. 132, 147 (1976) (Bellotti I), was not by way of setting forth the standard of unconstitutionality, as Justice O'Connor's later opinions did, but by way of expressing the conclusion of unconstitutionality. Justice Powell for a time appeared to employ a variant of "undue burden" analysis in several nonmajority opinions, see, e. g., Bellotti v. Baird, 443 U. S. 622, 647 (1979) (Bellotti II); Carey v. Population Services International, 431 U. S. 678, 705 (1977) (opinion concurring in part and concurring in judgment), but he too ultimately rejected that standard in his opinion for the Court in Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, Inc., 462 U. S. 416, 420, n. 1 (1983) (Akron I). The joint opinion's reliance on Maher v. Roe, 432 U. S. 464, 473 (1977), and Harris v. McRae, 448 U. S. 297, 314 (1980), is entirely misplaced, since those cases did not involve regulation of abortion, but mere refusal to fund it. In any event, Justice O'Connor's earlier formulations have apparently now proved unsatisfactory to the three Justices, who—in the name of stare decisis no less—today find it necessary to devise an entirely new version of "undue burden" analysis. See ante, at 877-879.
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