"Although it seems to me that the Court has considerably narrowed the scope of the power to forbid and regulate abortions that the States could reasonably have expected to enjoy under Roe and Danforth, the Court has not yet invalidated a statute simply requiring abortionists to determine whether a fetus is viable and forbidding the abortion of a viable fetus except where necessary to save the life or health of the mother. Nor has it yet ruled that the abortionist's determination of viability under such a standard must be final and is immune to civil or criminal attack. Sections 2 and 6(b) of the Pennsylvania law, for example, remain undisturbed by the District Court's judgment or by the judgment of this Court. What the Court has done is to issue a warning to the States, in the name of vagueness, that they should not attempt to forbid or regulate abortions when there is a chance for the survival of the fetus, but it is not sufficiently large that the abortionist considers the fetus to be viable. This edict has no constitutional warrant, and I cannot join it."
January 1, 1970