---
type: "Bill"
title: "AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 24 OF THE DELAWARE CODE CODIFYING U.S. SUPREME COURT PRECEDENT RELATING TO THE TERMINATION OF PREGNANCY."
description: "The United States Supreme Court’s decisions in Roe v. Wade and subsequent cases established that access to abortion is a constitutional right and that states may not prohibit abortion prior to viability. As a result of these decisions, and the exercise of prosecutorial discretion by the Attorney General, see Del. Op. Att’y Gen. No. 73-030, § III (Apr. 12, 1973), the Delaware Code's prohibitions against abortion are unconstitutional, and thus unenforceable."
jurisdiction: "us/states/de"
legislature: "Delaware General Assembly"
session: "149"
identifier: "SB 5"
citation: "Delaware SB 5 (149)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: []
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["Bryan Townsend", "Debra Heffernan", "Margaret Rose Henry", "Valerie Longhurst"]
version_count: 1
action_count: 23
vote_count: 2
first_action: "2017-05-04"
last_action: "2017-06-08"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/822ef383-9229-4f76-a531-d3f90c637a2e"
source_url: "https://legis.delaware.gov/BillDetail?LegislationId=25736"
source_hash: "296a18ebd4885b4f7c884f77de6f834363ea40fd2c008901d5e9f6762f80d76c"
vintage: "2026-07-01"
source_snapshot: "https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-06"
confidence: "reported"
tags: ["legislation", "bill", "us-de"]
---

# Delaware SB 5 (149) — AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 24 OF THE DELAWARE CODE CODIFYING U.S. SUPREME COURT PRECEDENT RELATING TO THE TERMINATION OF PREGNANCY.

The United States Supreme Court’s decisions in Roe v. Wade and subsequent cases established that access to abortion is a constitutional right and that states may not prohibit abortion prior to viability. As a result of these decisions, and the exercise of prosecutorial discretion by the Attorney General, see Del. Op. Att’y Gen. No. 73-030, § III (Apr. 12, 1973), the Delaware Code's prohibitions against abortion are unconstitutional, and thus unenforceable.

## Version chain

The bill's text revisions, in order — the diff chain from filing to enrollment.

1. **Bill Text** (committee substitute) — [source](https://legis.delaware.gov/json/BillDetail/GenerateHtmlDocument?legislationId=25736&legislationTypeId=6&docTypeId=2&legislationName=SS1)

## Votes

- SM — **22–16** (pass) · lower
- SM — **11–7** (pass) · upper

## Sponsors

- Bryan Townsend — primary (person)
- Debra Heffernan — primary (person)
- Margaret Rose Henry — primary (person)
- Valerie Longhurst — primary (person)
- Brian J. Bushweller — cosponsor (person)
- Bryon H. Short — cosponsor (person)
- Catherine Cloutier — cosponsor (person)
- David Bentz — cosponsor (person)
- David P. Sokola — cosponsor (person)
- Deborah Hudson — cosponsor (person)
- Edward S. Osienski — cosponsor (person)
- Harris B. McDowell — cosponsor (person)
- John A. Kowalko — cosponsor (person)
- John J. Viola — cosponsor (person)
- Nicole Poore — cosponsor (person)
- Paul S. Baumbach — cosponsor (person)
- Sean M. Lynn — cosponsor (person)
- Stephanie L. Hansen — cosponsor (person)
- Trey Charles Paradee — cosponsor (person)

## Timeline

The legislative action history — every referral, reading, and vote.

- **2017-05-04** was introduced and adopted in lieu of SB 5 `introduction`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 1 to SS 1 - Introduced and Placed With Bill `amendment-introduction`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 1 to SS 1 - Laid On Table in Senate `amendment-deferral`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 2 to SS 1 - Introduced and Placed With Bill `amendment-introduction`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 2 to SS 1 - Laid On Table in Senate `amendment-deferral`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 3 to SS 1 - Introduced and Placed With Bill `amendment-introduction`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 3 to SS 1 - Defeated By Senate. Votes: 7 YES 11 NO 2 NOT VOTING 1 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 4 to SS 1 - Introduced and Placed With Bill `amendment-introduction`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 4 to SS 1 - Defeated By Senate. Votes: 4 YES 11 NO 5 NOT VOTING 1 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 4 to SS 1 - Defeated By Senate. Votes: 4 YES 11 NO 5 NOT VOTING 1 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 5 to SS 1 - Introduced and Placed With Bill `amendment-introduction`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 5 to SS 1 - Defeated By Senate. Votes: 7 YES 11 NO 2 NOT VOTING 1 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 5 to SS 1 - Defeated By Senate. Votes: 7 YES 11 NO 2 NOT VOTING 1 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 6 to SS 1 - Introduced and Placed With Bill `amendment-introduction`
- **2017-05-09** Amendment SA 6 to SS 1 - Defeated By Senate. Votes: 9 YES 8 NO 3 NOT VOTING 1 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-05-09** Passed By Senate. Votes: 11 YES 7 NO 2 NOT VOTING 1 ABSENT `passage`
- **2017-05-10** Assigned to Health & Human Development Committee in House `introduction, referral-committee`
- **2017-05-17** Reported Out of Committee (Health & Human Development) in House with 8 On Its Merits `committee-passage`
- **2017-06-06** Amendment HA 1 to SS 1 - Defeated By House. Votes: 15 YES 23 NO 1 NOT VOTING 2 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-06-06** Amendment HA 4 to SS 1 - Defeated By House. Votes: 15 YES 20 NO 3 NOT VOTING 3 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-06-06** Amendment HA 5 to SS 1 - Defeated By House. Votes: 14 YES 24 NO 3 ABSENT `amendment-failure`
- **2017-06-06** Passed By House. Votes: 22 YES 16 NO 3 ABSENT `passage`
- **2017-06-08** Signed by Governor `executive-signature`

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/822ef383-9229-4f76-a531-d3f90c637a2e`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Delaware legislature records).