The saga of Texas’ late-term abortion ban has traveled an unconventional path — from “Hail Satan” to the Supreme Court. Ironically, it’s not the 20-week limit on abortions that has been challenged, but another provision requiring abortion clinics to meet the same standards in Texas as all other outpatient surgery clinics. Pro-abortion advocates sued, claiming that the requirements have the effect of denying women their constitutional right to abortions. The justices have added the case to their calendar, making it the first time since 2007 that they will weigh in on abortions and access:

In Texas, the fight is over two provisions of the law that Gov. Rick Perry signed in 2013. One requires abortion facilities to be constructed like surgical centers. The other allows doctors to perform abortions at clinics only if they have admitting privileges at a local hospital.

Texas had 41 abortion clinics before the clinic law. More than half of those closed when the admitting privileges requirement was allowed to take effect. Nineteen clinics remain.

The focus of the dispute at the Supreme Court is whether the law imposes what the court has called an undue burden on a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion. If allowed to take full effect, the law would leave no abortion clinics west of San Antonio and only one operating on a limited basis in the Rio Grande Valley.

The state has argued that women in west Texas already cross into New Mexico to obtain abortions at a clinic in suburban El Paso.

In its decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, in 1992, the court ruled that states generally can regulate abortion unless doing so places an undue burden on women. Casey was a huge victory for abortion-rights advocates because it ended up reaffirming the constitutional right to an abortion that the court established in Roe v. Wade in 1973.

In 2007, though, the court leaned the other way. The ruling in Gonzales v Carhart upheld a federal law prohibiting the practice of partial-birth abortion, a practice which seems to have made a comeback anyway, based on descriptions of procedures at Planned Parenthood clinics in undercover videos. While not a rejection of Roe or Casey, it nevertheless made it clear that the government had latitude to restrict abortion operations, even lacking an option for “the health of the mother,” as one of the challenges in Gonzales argued for the law’s unconstitutionality.

So — does this put the Supreme Court in position to relitigate Roe? Anything’s possible, but it’s much more likely that any dent in Roe will come in the form of a ruling that states have a legitimate interest in establishing standards for ambulatory-care outpatient clinics, and that those standards can apply regardless of the clinic’s purpose. That is, after all, the extant issue in this action. It would be a bit strange for a court to argue that the need to provide abortion access should require states to allow abortion mills to operate at a lower standard of safety than other ambulatory-care clinics, but at least one court has already ruled in that direction. Even if Kermit Gosnell’s chamber of horrors isn’t part of the official record, its specter should hang over the proceedings nonetheless.

The Alliance Defending Freedom statement hammers on that point:

“Texans should have full freedom to prioritize women’s health and safety over the bottom line of abortionists. The 5th Circuit was on firm ground to uphold this law, and therefore, the Supreme Court should affirm that decision. The law’s requirements are common-sense protections that ensure the maximum amount of safety for women. Abortionists should not be exempt from medical requirements that everyone else is required to follow.”

The composition of the court on this case makes it interesting to follow, too. It’s still a 4-4 court plus Anthony Kennedy on most of the hot-button issues. Barack Obama hasn’t had an opportunity to impact that balance despite nearly seven years in office, and he won’t get a chance to do so with this case. Bet on this decision being among the last to be published in this court year.