Here Are the Facts: What Has Happened and What it Means
On June 24, 2022, in a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court decided to overturn the landmark case of Roe vs Wade. This historic case provided constitutional protection for the right to bodily autonomy through abortion. With the striking down of Roe vs Wade, the American social-political sphere has since been in a frenzy. From planned parenthood canceling scheduled abortions in certain states, to the court now turning its sight to other historic cases. Here’s what’s happened and what it means.
What’s Happened: The Majority on The Court’s Ruling
The ruling of the supreme court went into effect after Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Samuel A. Alito, Jr., Brett Kavanaugh, Neil M. Gorsuch, and Clarence Thomas all voted to overturn the Roe vs Wade ruling. In quotes from Justice Samuel Alito on the majority’s ruling on June 24, the majority deemed the initial court ruling to be in misalignment with the “history and traditions” of the nation and found the constitution to “not confer a right to abortion.”
Justice Samuel Alito stated for the majority: “Roe found that the Constitution implicitly conferred a right to obtain an abortion, but it failed to ground its decision in text, history, or precedent. It relied on an erroneous historical narrative; it devoted great attention to and presumably relied on matters that have no bearing on the meaning of the Constitution; it disregarded the fundamental difference between the precedents on which it relied and the question before the Court; it concocted an elaborate set of rules, with different restrictions for each trimester of pregnancy, but it did not explain how this veritable code could be teased out of anything in the Constitution, the history of abortion laws, prior precedent, or any other cited source; and its most important rule (that States cannot protect fetal life prior to “viability”) was never raised by any party and has never been plausibly explained.”
The majority’s decision to overturn the landmark case brings into question the longevity of other rulings, such as same-sex marriage and contraception rights, in their supreme court standing. The majority, following their statement on the overturning, released a subsequent statement on the standing of other cases. “[B]ut have stated unequivocally that ‘[n]othing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion…We have also explained why that is so: rights regarding contraception and same-sex relationships are inherently different from the right to abortion because the latter (as we have stressed) uniquely involves what Roe and Casey termed ‘potential life.’”
While this is the opinion of the majority, Justice Clarence Thomas expressed opposing views shortly after the ruling, stating “ [In] future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold [contraception], Lawrence [sodomy], and Obergefell [same-sex marriage]. Because any substantive due process decision is “demonstrably erroneous,” we have a duty to “correct the error” established in those precedents…After overruling these demonstrably erroneous decisions, the question would remain whether other constitutional provisions guarantee the myriad rights that our substantive due process cases have generated.”
The Dissent on The Court’s Ruling
Based on rights to bodily autonomy and “constancy in the law,” the dissent, Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and John G. Roberts, Jr., offered opposing viewpoints to the allowance of individual states to decide abortion laws and the majority’s ruling. The decision “eliminates a 50-year-old constitutional right that safeguards women’s freedom and equal station…It breaches a core rule-of-law principle, designed to promote constancy in the law. In doing all of that, it places in jeopardy other rights, from contraception to same-sex intimacy and marriage. And finally, it undermines the Court’s legitimacy.” stated Justices Breyer, Kagan, and Sotomayor.
With no nationwide law protecting the right to abortion access, the dissent went on to offer possible future lives for those with the ability to give birth in states where abortion is criminalized. “But some States will not stop there. Perhaps, in the wake of today’s decision, a state law will criminalize the woman’s conduct too, incarcerating or fining her for daring to seek or obtain an abortion…Some states have enacted laws extending to all forms of abortion procedure, including taking medication in one’s own home…They have passed laws without any exceptions for when the woman is the victim of rape or incest. Under those laws, a woman will have to bear her rapist’s child or a young girl her father’s — no matter if doing so will destroy her life…The right Roe and Casey recognized does not stand alone. To the contrary, the Court has linked it for decades to other settled freedoms involving bodily integrity, familial relationships, and procreation.” And while the majority insisted the future of other privacy-based rulings was safe from examination, the dissent resounded that on the contrary all of these rulings were in jeopardy. “So one of two things must be true. Either the majority does not really believe in its own reasoning. Or if it does, all rights that have no history stretching back to the mid-19th century are insecure. Either the mass of the majority’s opinion is hypocrisy, or additional constitutional rights are under threat. It is one or the other.”
Laws, States, and Regulations in The Court’s Ruling
Following the court’s ruling previous trigger states proceeded to ban abortion access, some criminalizing the offense into law. Ten states have banned abortion–South Dakota, Wisconsin, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, and West Virginia–with Idaho, North Dakota, Tennessee, and Wyoming soon to follow.
With 21 states still deeming abortion legal, President Joe Biden signed an executive order into law to legally mitigate the fallout from the court’s ruling. The executive order addresses the lingering questions on the minds of Americans: on traveling to pro-abortion states, medical practitioner confidentiality, data privacy protection, and more.
What it Means
With the series of bans in place and current protections expanded for states where abortion is legal, the fate of abortion rights and other privacy-related rulings are in the hands of each state and the people therein. Abortion legality will continue to vary from state to state, which could continue to create further abortion bans, or see the law contested with more states seeking to legalize abortion.
While the majority collectively state that other rulings will not be struck down by the court, only time will tell. It will be up to individual states to begin to place state-to-state protections on these rights if and when these protections are overturned. Lastly, the November election will hold significant precedence in the political future of the country, with abortion and future rulings as hot topics on state ballots. The power may be in the hands of each state currently, but it will be up to the people to place state representatives into office that reflect the desires of the people therein.