Cite as: 506 U. S. 263 (1993)
Opinion of Souter, J.
mus is not based on race or a like class characteristic, and even when the ultimate object of the conspiracy is to violate a constitutional guarantee that applies solely against state action.
V
Turning now to the application of the prevention clause as I thus read it, I conclude that a conspiracy falls within the terms of the prevention clause when its purpose is to hinder or prevent law enforcement authorities from giving normal police protection to women attempting to exercise the right to abortion recognized in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey, 505 U. S. 833 (1992), and Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113 (1973). My reason for this is not a view that a State's frustration of an individual's choice to obtain an abortion would, without more, violate equal protection, but that a classification necessarily lacks any positive relationship to a legitimate state purpose, and consequently fails rational-basis scrutiny, when it withdraws a general public benefit on account of the exercise of a right otherwise guaranteed by the Constitution. See Police Dept. of Chicago v. Mosley, 408 U. S. 92, 95 (1972) (applying the Equal Protection Clause and finding no "appropriate governmental interest suitably furthered" by a discrimination that would independently violate the First Amendment). While such a discrimination, were it wrought by the State, could be treated as a burden on the exercise of a right protected by a substantive due process guarantee, see Casey, supra, and forbidden as such, the denial of generally available civic benefits to one group solely because its members seek what the Constitution guarantees would just as clearly be a classification for a forbidden purpose, which is to say, independently a violation of equal protection. See Mosley, supra; Carey v. Brown, 447 U. S. 455 (1980).9 When private individuals conspire for the pur-9 I emphasize the substantive due process guarantee at issue here because my analysis rests on the fact that, treating the conspirators as the State, the imposition of restrictions on abortion more strict than those
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