ABORTION & REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH
Abortion is legal in Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania, however, has long been one of the most heavily restricted states, with 1,237 pages of burdensome, medically unnecessary, and internally incoherent statutes, regulations, and administrative guidelines governing the provision of abortion care.
We are the de facto legal arm of the reproductive rights movement in Pennsylvania.
We have been working to protect and advance reproductive rights and legally representing abortion providers in Pennsylvania since our doors opened in 1974.
We have represented abortion providers in Pennsylvania since the 1970s.
We provide pro bono representation to Pennsylvania-based freestanding abortion providers in both major impact litigation and day-to-day compliance issues. We guide our clients through increasingly complex and burdensome sets of regulations and amid an onslaught of legislation designed to force them to close their doors and deprive Pennsylvanians of access to reproductive healthcare including abortion.
With two offices in Pennsylvania, 51 years of on-the-ground experience steeped in local, state, and federal abortion law, and decades-long relationships with state and local agencies, we are uniquely situated to navigate post-Dobbs challenges to protect abortion law and access in Pennsylvania while building a post-Dobbs state-based blueprint other states can follow.
We are currently representing Pennsylvania’s freestanding abortion providers in a major reproductive autonomy case in state court.
Allegheny Reproductive Health Center v. Pennsylvania Department of Human Services is Pennsylvania’s major reproductive autonomy litigation where we are representing abortion providers challenging Pennsylvania’s statutory ban on Medicaid coverage of abortion.
In January 2024, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania issued a ruling in this case that restored the Pennsylvania Equal Rights Amendment after 39 years of near-dormancy under a bad precedent established in 1985. Learn more about the Allegheny Repro precedent and what it means for the legal landscape regarding challenging abortion restrictions here.
This case was filed in January 2019. This is the latest update.
We are leaders in the movement to hold unregulated pregnancy centers accountable for how they track and treat their targets, especially pregnant people, Black women, and teenagers.
Sometimes called “crisis pregnancy centers,” “anti-abortion centers,” or “fake clinics,” the unregulated anti-abortion pregnancy center industry is a $1.7 billion dollar industry gaining more power and public funds than ever since the U.S. Supreme Court eliminated our federal right to abortion in 2022, despite posing a scope of harm to maternal and public health. After many years of advocacy and public education, the CPC industry was defunded in Pennsylvania at the end of 2023 after extensive allegations of misuse and waste of public funds including a public report alleging “skimming” of funds by the former Auditor General of Pennsylvania.
Learn more about the unregulated pregnancy center industry and our work here.
We help young people seeking abortion care by representing them in judicial bypass proceedings.
Under Pennsylvania law, young people who cannot or do not want to obtain consent for one parent can seek permission from a judge to make their own pregnancy decision in a court hearing known as “judicial bypass.”
Go here to learn more about judicial bypass and find fact sheets in English and Spanish.
We work to defend patients & providers from anti-abortion harassment and violence.
WLP attorneys work to protect patients and providers from anti-abortion harassment and violence through legal work to protect buffer zones and support clients and witnesses involved in Federal Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act violations.
Buffer zones are limited, fixed areas surrounding the entrance of a building designed to protect patients and facility employees from harassment, obstruction, and potential violence. Two of the few continuously enforced statutory buffer zones in the country remain in effect in Pennsylvania: one in Pittsburgh, and one in Harrisburg.
Unfortunately, these buffer zones were implemented Pennsylvania has a long history of anti-abortion harassment and violence outside and within facilities that provide abortion care.
We are proudly state-based but participate in major U.S. Supreme Court cases.
We routinely participate in major reproductive autonomy litigation before the U.S. Supreme Court either by participating as or representing amici curiae, and have represented plaintiffs in three landmark challenges to abortion restrictions before the U.S. Supreme Court:
- Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case re-affirming the core of abortion rights and striking down Pennsylvania’s husband notification statute.
- Elizabeth Blackwell Health Center v. Knoll (1995), striking down Pennsylvania’s rape and incest reporting requirements and second-physician certification requirements for low-income women seeking Medicaid abortions.
- ACOG v. Thornburgh (1986), striking down Pennsylvania abortion restrictions and reaffirming Roe v. Wade.
We work to
We work to protect the rights and health of pregnant people who are incarcerated.
Our work protecting the rights of women who are incarcerated includes litigation and advocacy against shackling pregnant women with handcuffs and leg irons, and for women denied abortion care through Medicaid while incarcerated.
Notable Litigation & Amicus Curiae Representation
Allegheny Reproductive Health Center v. Pa. Department of Human Services (Medicaid Case) On January 16, 2019 attorneys from the Women’s Law Project; attorney David S. Cohen; Planned Parenthood Federation of America; and the private law firm Pepper Hamilton LLP, a group of Pennsylvania abortion providers filed a lawsuit challenging the state statute that bans abortion coverage through the Pennsylvania Medicaid program. Case is ongoing.
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Trump On June 7, 2019, attorneys at the Women’s Law Project filed an amicus brief in support of the Pennsylvania Attorney General in Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Trump, a federal court challenge to the Trump contraceptive coverage rules that permit employers to refuse to cover birth control based on their personal religious, ethical or moral beliefs. Case has been consolidated with Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania and is ongoing.
Allentown Women’s Center, Inc. v. John Dunkle, Anthony J. Sulpizio, Mark Michael Bogunovich and John Doe Nos. 1 – 5 On April 11, 2019, lawyers from the Women’s Law Project and the law firm Cozen O’Connor filed an action against three anti-abortion extremists who regularly protest outside a healthcare facility that provides abortion care and healthcare for the LGBTQ community in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The case was successfully settled.
Jean Crocco v. Pennsylvania Department of Health (2019) Counsel for Pennsylvania abortion providers as third parties with direct interest in the case. Argued the case before Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court on June 3, 2019. The three-judge panel issued an opinion affirming the Office of Open Records’ upholding of the Department of Health’s redaction of personal information from the records request.
Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, 579 US _ (2016). Counsel for ten abortion providers in amicus curiae brief to the U.S. Supreme Court which contributed to the Supreme Court striking down the Texas law subjecting clinics to admitting privileges and ambulatory surgical regulations.
National Abortion Federation (NAF) v. Center for Medical Progress, C15-3522 (9th Cir. 2016). Counsel for amici urging affirmance of preliminary injunction prohibiting disclosure of stealthily recorded videos of 2014 and 2015 National Abortion Federation annual meetings, in violation of signed confidentiality agreements.
Colleen Reilly, Becky Biter, and Rosalie Gross v. City of Harrisburg, 1:16-cv-510 (M.D. Pa. 2016). Representation of non-party witnesses for defendant in abortion protesters’ First Amendment challenge to Harrisburg’s 20-foot fixed buffer zone ordinance.
Bruni v. City of Pittsburgh, 91 F. Supp. 3d 658, (W.D. Pa. 2015), vacated, in part, affirmed in part, remanded by, 2016 U.S. App. LEXIS 10019 (3d Cir. Pa., June 1, 2016). Counsel for amici curiae in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit on behalf of Planned Parenthood of Western Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh Pro-Choice Escorts opposing a First Amendment challenge to Pittsburgh’s 15-foot buffer zone, which the Court ruled constitutional.
Planned Parenthood Southeastern Pennsylvania, New Voices Pittsburgh, and Michelle Bonaventura v. Beverly Mackereth and Dionisio Mignacca, C.A. No. 2015-cv-135 (E.D. Pa. 2015). Co-counsel for class of women challenging refusal of PA Department of Human Services to timely transfer to comprehensive coverage approximately 85,000 women enrolled in SelectPlan for Women, a limited Medicaid category covering only family planning.
Blades v. Brushaw 1:11-cv-00026-MPK (W.D. Pa. 2012). Co-counsel in civil rights lawsuit by a former prisoner challenging shackling while giving birth to her baby en route to a hospital.
Kuhns v. City of Allentown, C.A. No. 08-2606 (E.D. Pa. 2011). Co-counsel for defendant Allentown Women’s Center in abortion protest case). (attach provider affidavit)
Brown v. City of Pittsburgh, 586 F.3d 263 (3d Cir. Pa. 2009). Supported City of Pittsburgh in its defense of a protester challenge to the constitutionality of the buffer zone in support of which WLP had researched, designed, and successfully advocated in 2005.
Anspach v. City of Philadelphia, 503 F.3d 256 (3d Cir. 2007). Counsel for amici curiae supporting successful city health center sued by parents of teenage girl who consented to emergency contraception without parental involvement.
Alaska v. Planned Parenthood of Alaska No. 6184 (Alaska Nov.2, 2007) .Counsel for amicus curai in support of Planned Parenthood of Alaska’s challenge to the Alaska’s judicial bypass law.
Farley v. City of Philadelphia, No. 06-2110 (E.D. Pa. 2006). Co-counsel for plaintiff in civil rights action challenging prison’s deliberate indifference to woman in preterm labor.
Stachokus v. Meyers, C.A. 63-E (Luzerne Cty. C.P. Aug. 5, 2002). Co-counsel for defendant pregnant woman seeking to lift ex parte state court injunction obtained by boyfriend ordering her not to terminate her pregnancy.
Ferguson v. City of Charleston, 532 U.S. 67 (2001). Co-counsel for petitioners in challenge to hospital-based police searches of pregnant women suspected of drug use.
Crawley v. Catoe, 257 F.3d 395 (4th Cir. 2001). Counsel in appeal from denial of habeas corpus petition for South Carolina woman convicted of criminal child endangerment for untreated addiction during pregnancy.
Stenberg v. Carhart, 530 U.S. 914 (2000). Counsel for seventy-five amici curiae supporting women’s equality in abortion procedure ban case.
Elizabeth Blackwell Health Center for Women v. Knoll, 61 F.3d 170 (3d Cir. 1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 1093 (1996). Co-counsel for plaintiffs-appellees in successful challenge to state law requiring rape and incest survivors to make police reports and requiring women with life-threatening pregnancies to have condition certified by two physicians in order to be eligible for Medicaid-funded abortions.
Roe v. Operation Rescue, 54 F.3d 133 (3d Cir. 1995) on remand, No. 88-5157 (E.D. Pa. May 23, 1995). Counsel for petitioner who successfully obtained civil contempt against clinic blockaders.
Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 (1992). Co-counsel for plaintiffs in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case affirming the constitutional right to abortion while changing the legal standard under which abortion restrictions are reviewed to permit restrictions that are not unduly burdensome.
Roe v. Operation Rescue 919 F.2d 857 (1990). Counsel for plaintiffs in civil action winning injunctive relief against reproductive health clinic blockades by anti-abortion activists.
ACOG v. Thornburgh 476 US 747 (1986). Counsel for plaintiffs in challenge to Pennsylvania’s Abortion Control Act of 1982 in which the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed the constitutional principles of Roe v. Wade.
