Whalen v. Roe

Citation: Whalen v. Roe, 429 U.S. 589 (1977).

Whalen concerned a New York law that created a centralized state computer file of the names and addresses of all persons who obtained medicines containing narcotics pursuant to a doctor’s prescription. Although the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the state’s authority, it found this gathering of information to affect two interests.

The first was an “individual interest in avoiding disclosure of personal matters”; the other, “the interest in independence in making certain kinds of important decisions.” These two interests rest on the substantive due process protections found in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments.

The Court specifically recognized a "right of informational privacy."