Posted on 06/25/2022 8:57:19 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Friday’s momentous Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v Wade has leftist politicians screaming, news anchors sputtering, and Twitter on fire, with both sides of the debate weighing in. All these loud voices, yet few of them seem to have read the opinion.
What does it actually say?
The final opinion was written by Justice Samuel Alito and is mostly similar to the draft that was leaked in May. The opinion ruled on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which centered on a Mississippi law that banned abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Arguably the most important line in the ruling comes on the first page of 213-page pdf document (emphasis mine):
Held: The Constitution does not confer a right to abortion; Roe and Casey are overruled; and the authority to regulate abortion is returned to the people and their elected representatives.
Boom. Authority is returned to the people and their representatives. Where it should have been all along.
On page 4, in one of his most powerful paragraphs, Alito dunked on the 1973 court for “usurping power”:
Roe was on a collision course with the Constitution from the day it was decided, Casey perpetuated its errors, and those errors do not concern some arcane corner of the law of little importance to the American people. Rather, wielding nothing but “raw judicial power,”… the Court usurped the power to address a question of profound moral and social importance that the Constitution unequivocally leaves for the people.
Even “longtime defender of reproductive and women’s rights,” the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg agreed in 2013 that the Roe was flawed:
She would’ve preferred that abortion rights be secured more gradually, in a process that included state legislatures and the courts… Ginsburg also was troubled that the focus on Roe was on a right to privacy, rather than women’s rights.
The problem with Roe all along is that it distorted the 14th Amendment’s right to privacy and expanded it to include abortion. Alito says:
In interpreting what is meant by the Fourteenth Amendment’s reference to ‘liberty,’ we must guard against the natural human tendency to confuse what that Amendment protects with our own ardent views about the liberty that Americans should enjoy. That is why the Court has long been ‘reluctant’ to recognize rights that are not mentioned in the Constitution.
Alito goes on to discuss the theory of life, soundly rebuking the dissenting opinion signed by Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan.
Our opinion is not based on any view about if and when prenatal life is entitled to any of the rights enjoyed after birth. The dissent, by contrast, would impose on the people a particular theory about when the rights of personhood begin. According to the dissent, the Constitution requires the States to regard a fetus as lacking even the most basic human right—to live—at least until an arbitrary point in a pregnancy has passed. Nothing in the Constitution or in our Nation’s legal traditions authorizes the Court to adopt that ‘theory of life.”
He’s rejecting the dissenters’ view that the Constitution regards a fetus as lacking even the most basic right. While he doesn’t specifically say that fetuses have rights, he’s certainly not willing to claim they don’t.
Many on the left, including the dissenting justices, are freaking out that Clarence Thomas, in a non-binding concurring opinion, wrote that the decision calls into question old cases like gay marriage and access to birth control.
Justice Clarence Thomas, in his concurring opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, fomented fears about what other rights could disappear: The same rationale, he said, should also be used to overturn rights to contraception and same-sex marriage.
https://t.co/tMsDFDqmAI— The New York Times (@nytimes) June 24, 2022
Alito’s opinion shut the door on revisiting old cases, though, flatly stating that “nothing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.”
It’s a powerful opinion, one which is greatly overdue, rights a legal wrong, and hands back power to the states—where it should be. Thank you, Justice Alito.
Excellent scholar, that man.
Pretty straight forward
Actually if you’re states rights you agree...and win.
But if you’re pro-life you lose. This means murdering babies is allowed to be ok by states. So cali can decide to murder babies at 9 months as it’s coming out of the womb just because the mom says I don’t want this baby—it has blue eyes!
Rush would be smiling. Not gloating, not dancing a fool, but just smiling.
It doesn’t matter. Current generation is too stupid to comprehend this kind of reasoning
It’s a huge win for the pro-life side. It means that abortion can be argued on the basis of science instead of making all discussion moot by putting it beyond debate and into a judicial lockbox.
I have to disagree. If you want to murder babies move to a state that allows it. And stay the hell out of Idaho.
It’s true that this is not an all out victory over the scourge of abortion. A preborn baby’s right to life should be inherent and treated equally in every state and territory of the US.
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There's nothing in the Constitution about homo marriage, or regular marriage for that matter. Another ruling pulled out of black robe ass.
Revisit it anyway, and force Alito to decide.
States should immediately enact restricts on homo marriage, and let it wind through the courts.
Same with sodomy. Nothing in the Constitution about the right to stick your thingy in another's man's booty.
As mentioned, one of the many things that bothered me was how it was argued on a right to privacy and not women’s rights. Even RBG had a issue with that. If it was argued on a women’s rights basis originally I would have had much more respect for any ruling.
Personally, the Mississippi law that permitted abortion up to 15 weeks was reasonable to me. Abortion really came on my radar when they began demanding access at any time for any reason, even just until the due date because the mother decided they didn’t want the child.
I took it to mean don’t try to expand this ruling. The same sex marriage is another issue. We are talking the right to kill babies here. Another case another ruling. IMO
I would argue why the Gov is involved in marriage in any way. As you said, it’s not in the constitution, they shouldn’t be involved.
There a few values or educated insights exhibited in an epicurean, decadent culture. The current dichotomy that exists in America is not unlike the political divide that existed in Rome at the end of the Republic.
Interesting that the abortionists in Congress make so much noise about losing in the supreme court when they could have taken abortion up in the legislative branch....but didn’t. Their apparent intention was to keep their own hands clean while tarnishing the judicial branch. No politician wants to run on passing abortion laws, no matter WHAT they say. That is why they pushed so hard to keep the stain on the court. Now if the progressive radicalists want to keep killing babies, they will have to answer to the people with the blood on their own hands instead of the courts hands. Looks like a new day for those without a voice to get one and a new dilemma for those loud mouthed politicians who have openly stated they will vote for abortion legislation but in reality will not run on it because THEY know that their chances of being elected or reelected for their stance on abortion will be just as dead as the babies they have killed over the past 50 years. My question to all abortionists is simple. Isn’t 50 years of baby killing enough for you?
I believe you are correct, FRiend. The last two major decisions by this court are reason to celebrate on some level, and Rush would be leading the party. Dang I miss him 😢.
Nice post. Regards
Imagine if we had gotten Harriet Miers instead of Sam Alito? God knows what He’s doing.
However according to the media, the Court’s decision not only ends abortion everywhere, but ends women’s rights, bans contraception and bans gay marriage. The liberal elites would have use believe that women would now be treated no different than under the Taliban’s version of Islam. I am particularly galled by the quick condemnation by foreign leaders like Trudeau and especially the UN. It is utter hypocrisy that these same leaders are silent about the actual maltreatment of women in Muslim countries, but choose to criticize the US where the abortion issue is now up to the voters to decide.
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