One Justice May Decide the Next Major Abortion Case

Beginning in July, anti-abortion activists released videos that appeared to show officials at Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the largest provider of abortions in the U.S., discussing the sale of fetal tissue. In response, Republicans in Congress threatened to shut down the government unless federal funding to the group was eliminated. Trying to squelch the controversy, Planned Parenthood announced in mid-October it would stop accepting reimbursement for the cost of providing fetal tissue to medical researchers who use it to develop vaccines and study degenerative diseases.

Abortion hasn’t played a starring role in U.S. politics since 2007, when the Supreme Court upheld the federal ban on “partial birth” abortions, striking down claims that the law infringed on women’s health-care rights. This term, the justices are likely to hear a challenge from Texas, where abortion providers are attacking a 2013 law that threatens to reduce the number of clinics offering the procedure to a dozen from about 40 in the state. (Michael Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg LP, the parent of Bloomberg Businessweek, supports Planned Parenthood through his personal philanthropy.)