Leavitt v. Jane L., 518 U.S. 137, 5 (1996) (per curiam)

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Cite as: 518 U. S. 137 (1996)

Per Curiam

the act and conjecture that they should stand independently of the portions which are invalid." State v. Salt Lake City, 445 P. 2d 691, 696 (Utah 1968). See also Salt Lake City v. International Assn. of Firefighters, 563 P. 2d 786, 791 (Utah 1977); Carter v. Beaver County Service Area No. One, 399 P. 2d 440, 441 (Utah 1965). But those concerns are absent from this case, for two reasons. First, because there is no need to resort to "conjecture": The legislature's abortion laws include not merely the standard "saving" clause, but a provision that could not be clearer in its message that the legislature "would have passed [every aspect of the law] irrespective of the fact that any one or more provision . . . be declared unconstitutional." § 76-7-317.2 And second, because the two sections at issue here are not "interrelated" in any relevant sense—i. e., in the sense of being so interdependent that the remainder of the statute cannot function effectively without the invalidated provision, or in the sense that the invalidated provision could be regarded as part of a legislative compromise, extracted in exchange for the inclusion of other provisions of the statute.3 Nothing like that appears here. The Court of Appeals described § 302(3) as

2 In none of the Utah cases relied upon by the Court of Appeals was there a legislative statement of this sort. In both Salt Lake City v. International Assn. of Firefighters, 563 P. 2d 786 (1977), and Carter v. Beaver County Service Area No. One, 399 P. 2d 440 (1965), the saving clauses at issue simply declared: "If any provision of this act, or the application of any provision to any person or circumstance, is held invalid, the remainder of this act shall not be affected thereby." See 1975 Utah Laws, ch. 102, § 10; 1961 Utah Laws, ch. 34, § 3. And in State v. Salt Lake City, 445 P. 2d 691, 696 (1968), the court treated the saving clause in the municipal ordinance under review as no different from the one discussed in Carter, upon which the court relied.

3 Compare International Assn. of Firefighters, supra, at 791 ("The [invalidated] provisions . . . are an integral part of the act. . . . The concept of binding arbitration is wholly interdependent with the other provisions of the act"); Carter, supra, at 441-442 ("[T]he separability clause . . . is ineffective, because of the dependency of the remaining sections upon the provisions declared inoperative") (emphases added).

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