Roe v. Wade Turns 47

Today marks the 47th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, which held that the constitutional right to privacy included a woman's right to terminate a pregnancy. Roe was not immediately controversial when first announced (it was a 7:2 decision written by a Nixon appointee)...

— Melissa Murray (@ProfMMurray) January 22, 2020

Prof. Murray, of the Strict Scrutiny Podcast, was the pro-choice talking head on the Landmark Cases Roe v. Wade episode and contributed to a new collection of reproductive law stories (went to an event promoting it).  As she notes on that thread, not only is the Supreme Court (the Kavanaugh Court, who specifically was chosen for his views here, including delaying a teenage immigrant from having an abortion in a key case) going to hear a key case this term, but already many women only have abortion rights in name only.  I would cite such things like some states having one clinic (which sounds ridiculous), funding being blocked, waiting periods (especially for teens) among other things there.

I have been talking about this case on this blog for about the length of time it was operating.  Wrote about it in high school back before even the Webster was the warning sign thirty years ago. As a matter of constitutional law, this was influenced by the off way justices were appointed since 1969, helped by more than one tainted election (2000/2016).  It is a tad absurd that it was then that the last Court with a Democratic appointee majority ended with the effect not as blatant given the reality of liberal Republicans up to and including David Souter.  A lot of the focus should be in the state legislatures and the reasons why it is threatened there can be discussed too.

There is a continual argument that the best way is to send this back to the states. As I noted there, it's hard to see how that holds up, especially on a consistent basis, given the basic right at issue.  Some are wary about resting things on some right to privacy or "liberty" interest as was the approach post-Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which also opened up the path to more regulations. I repeatedly here explained how it fit into long precedent in this regard.  It is not just a matter of basic justice and health care. There are multiple clear constitutional demands.  And, as some even back then noted, this includes women being equal citizens.  There is in fact a connection there to the Nineteenth Amendment. As noted here, this factors into the ERA as well.

Surely, and the introduction of the book links says this, the federal courts or even courts at all (though state courts repeatedly matter a lot here, including state constitutions, which many wary of the federal courts are much less worried about) are not the only thing important here. New York, where abortion rights are rather safe as much as funding of health care (at least comparably), firmly as a matter of statutory law protected abortion once the Democrats gained full control.  Some have noted that even as abortion is legal, less and less doctors study it in school.  There is also a general need to convince people that at the very least abortion is a valid choice, especially in certain situations. 

It is somewhat amazing among other things that reproductive liberty -- and that is the wider issue -- is still seen as an open question. That we are debating the reach of contraceptives being covered on health care plans for workers and students. Modern means such as abortion pills and telemedicine (though some states limit this) help to some degree. We are not on the road to The Handmaid's Tale.  But, the threat is real and there still needs to be work to be done in the area of reproductive liberty.

As Roe v. Wade gets to the an age where women might be on edge of childbearing age -- though the wider issue of sexual liberty covers postmenopausal years too -- this is still the case.