US high court takes up explosive abortion debate

The US Supreme Court hears its most important abortion case in decades on Tuesday, with all eyes on the critical swing vote of Justice Anthony Kennedy.
The case has huge implications on this hot-button issue that could determine the availability of abortion services across the country, just as a highly polarized American electorate goes to the polls in this election year.
But the sudden death of stalwart conservative Justice Antonin Scalia could complicate the outcome of this high-stakes debate.
The vacancy on the nine-seat bench leaves the court evenly split 4-4 between conservatives and liberals.
If the liberal justices fail to swing Kennedy to their side, a lower court decision that had ended up before the Supreme Court will be upheld, in this case meaning a restrictive Texan abortion law would stay in place.

The vote of Kennedy, who helped draft a ruling 24 years ago that reaffirmed a woman's right to abortion and said any state restrictions could not impose an "undue burden" to that right, is thus critical.

The Texan bid is part of a series of conservative efforts seeking to challenge the historic Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion in 1973.
The 2013 Texas law at the heart of the case imposes restrictions on abortion clinics so rigorous that activists say they could force 75 percent of the facilities to go out of business.
That would leave just 10 abortion clinics in the sprawling state with an estimated 5.4 million women of child-bearing age.

As a result, hundreds of thousands of women are having or will have to seek abortion services far from their homes, and face a weeks-long wait.
Under the law, doctors who perform abortions must have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals and the clinics must meet the standards of an ambulatory surgical center, a medical facility for low-risk surgeries.
Backers of the law say it aims to protect women's health.
But critics say that's a pretext for a thinly veiled Republican attempt to have Roe v Wade overturned.
"I am highly skeptical of the claims that these measures are intended to safeguard women's health," said Sherry Colb of Cornell Law School.

"They operate as stumbling blocks in the path of clinics that had already been providing safe (and legal) abortions.