"Even before Roe was decided, states that permitted abortion were taking action to protect those physicians or hospitals that objected to participation in abortions. In 1971, New York enacted a criminal law prohibiting discrimination against any person for his or her refusal to participate in abortions. Many other states—including Arkansas, Alaska, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, and Maryland—included explicit conscience protections for individuals and institutions in the same statutes that liberalized their abortion laws. That trend of protecting conscientious objectors to abortions continued and dramatically expanded in the aftermath of Roe. Today, virtually every state in the country has some sort of statute protecting individuals and, in many cases, entities who refuse to provide abortions. Most of these statutes arose in the decade following Roe. Some states expressly limit this protection to the practice of abortion, which is treated specially. Other states protect conscience for other procedures as well."