Simone Veil was a French magistrate and stateswoman who served as Health Minister in several governments and was President of the European Parliament from 1979 to 1982, the first woman to hold that office. As health minister, she is best remembered for advancing women’s legal rights in France, in particular for the 1975 law that legalized abortion, today known as Loi Veil. From 1998 to 2007 she was a member of the Constitutional Council, France’s highest legal authority.