[tpaine]

"So go pass a new law in Texas instead of soiling our constitution with this new alleged right --"

Protecting privacy with
due process is not a new concept:

           In its discussion of the scope of "liberty" protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment the Court stated:

Neither the Bill of Rights nor the specific practices of the States at the time of the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment marks the outer limits of the substantive sphere of liberty which the Fourteenth Amendment protects.

See U.S. Const., Amend. 9.

As the second Justice Harlan recognized:

     "[T]he full scope of the liberty guaranteed by the Due Process Clause `cannot be found in or limited by the precise terms of the specific guarantees elsewhere provided in the Constitution.
This `liberty´ is not a series of isolated points pricked out in terms of the taking of property;
the freedom of speech, press, and religion;
the right to keep and bear arms;
the freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures;
and so on. 

It is a rational continuum which, broadly speaking, includes a freedom from all substantial arbitrary impositions and purposeless restraints, . . . and which also recognizes, what a reasonable and sensitive judgment must, that certain interests require particularly careful scrutiny of the state needs asserted to justify their abridgment."

Poe v. Ullman, supra, 367 U.S. at 543, 81 S.Ct., at 1777

[The Old Hoosier]

I found your Ullman citation, in which you cite the lone dissent of Justice Harlan (by the way, it's 367 U.S. 497), which I don't think makes for much of an argument.

I cannot find the other quotation, the first one you gave. I'm looking now.

[The Old Hoosier]

You're quoting Planned Parenthood v. Casey, one of the most convoluted and worst decisions ever made. And you're quoting the three Justices who wanted to protect the sacred right to abort babies, but weren't content to just say "that's the way it is," instead contorting themselves in an effort to justify their position (Justice Blackmun was much more straightforward--he just basically said "Roe v. Wade, case closed).

Here's some context to the precise quote you gave: Roe determined that a woman's decision to terminate her pregnancy is a "liberty" protected against state interference by the substantive component of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Neither the Bill of Rights nor the specific practices of States at the time of the Fourteenth Amendment's adoption marks the outer limits of the substantive sphere of such "liberty." Rather, the adjudication of substantive due process claims may require this Court to exercise its reasoned judgment in determining the boundaries between the individual's liberty and the demands of organized society.

This is corrupt jurisprudence: the whole basis of this decision is that these three justices--O'Connor, Kennedy, and Souder--were going to try to come up with some excuse for upholding Roe v. Wade at all costs.

The interesting corollary is that if you accept sodomy as a constitutional right, you almost certainly must accept Roe v. Wade.