Dalton v. Little Rock Family Planning Svcs., 516 U.S. 474 (1996)

Dalton v. Little Rock Family Planning Services

No. 95-1025

Decided March 18, 1996
516 U.S. 474

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

Syllabus

Respondents, Medicaid providers and physicians who perform abortions in Arkansas, filed this suit against petitioner state officials, claiming that Amendment 68 of the State Constitution, § 1 of which prohibits using state funds to pay for any abortion except one to save the mother’s life, conflicts with a requirement in Title XIX of the Social Security Act, as amended by the 1994 version of the "Hyde Amendment," that States fund abortions where the pregnancy resulted from an act of rape or incest. The District Court, inter alia, enjoined enforcement of the amendment in its entirety for so long as the State accepts federal Medicaid funds. The Eighth Circuit affirmed.,

Held: Amendment 68 can be enjoined only to the extent that it imposes obligations inconsistent with Title XIX. In a preemption case such as this, state law is displaced only to the extent that it actually conflicts with federal law. Pacific Gas & Elec. Co. v. State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Comm’n, 461 U.S. 190, 204. Because Amendment 68 was challenged only insofar as it conflicted with Title XIX, it was improper to enjoin its application to funding that does not involve the Medicaid program. The injunction is overbroad in its temporal scope as well. The Hyde Amendment is not permanent legislation; it was enacted as part of the appropriation of funds for certain Executive Departments for one fiscal year. Its history -- before 1994, it limited federal funding to those abortions necessary to save the mother’s life -- identifies the possibility that a different version may be enacted in the future. Thus, it was improper for the District Court to enjoin Amendment 68’s enforcement for so long as the State accepted federal Medicaid funds.