The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday took up a key case in the national abortion debate — whether Idaho’s near-total abortion ban conflicts with a federal law protecting patients in medical emergencies.

Hundreds of abortion rights and anti-abortion protestors gathered outside the court as the justices heard arguments regarding the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act and whether it should cover emergency abortions, even in states where the procedure is banned.

“What if you need an abortion not because you’re going to die, but because you’re going to lose your uterus, and therefore no longer able to have children?” Kimberly Mutcherson, professor of law at Rutgers University said. “That is a reason under EMTALA where a physician can say ‘OK, we need to go ahead and have an abortion.’ Under Idaho law, you cannot do that.”

In New Jersey, advocates and lawmakers, including U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherill (D-11th) are urging the Supreme Court to uphold the law. “The reproductive health care in these states that are imposing these draconian laws is getting worse and worse and worse,” Sherill said. “You have doctors who are afraid to provide basic treatment because of these laws that involve criminal time if the state disagrees with the decision that doctors made,” Sherrill said.