RvW Overturned - Abortions Now Illegal

[Dwight]

Another has children via IVF, that is more at risk, the egg has been fertilized and we can’t have that.

After the successful implantation, were they left with any spare fertilized eggs that were not implanted? What did they do with them?

My understanding is like most there were multiple eggs fertilized, then a few were put in in hopes that as the case would be at least one successfully implanted and that there are still some fertilized eggs sitting in a freezer in case they want to give it another go to have another kid.

[msnobody]

Nothing in the article, just trust in God and submission to his will for our lives.

Yeah, you didn’t read the article.

- Doc

As best I recall there was something in the article about being raped and the most notable thing was about the little girl whose mother said the end of her life was so bad that if she could go back in time, she would have had an abortion.

[Dwight]

That's the view expressed of the founders, an ordained special group who exactly envisioned an America like an imaginary idealized version of the 1950s as remembered by boomers with blood sugar issues messing their memories up.

Don’t forget the lead poisoning. Something the Supreme Court might gut the EPA’s ability to regulate as soon as tomorrow.

Ben Franklin had a recipe added to a book. Alito says the 14th amendment was passed without a context of abortion, except abortions were a reality everywhere in the US when the 14th amendment was passed. There is surprisingly very little new under the sun. If we are going to have originalism for the context things were written/passed then let’s look at it fully, and then clearly the second amendment must apply only to muskets and canons.

[Vēritās]

https://apnews.com/article/supreme-cour ... 7410a0a21d

Total Ban except: Rape/Incest/Mother's Health

Wyoming
South Dakota


Total Ban except: Mother's Health (no Rape/Incest exception)

Missouri
Arkansas
Louisiana
Mississippi
Alabama
Tennessee
Kentucky
Florida (before 15 weeks)


Ban before 6 weeks- "Fetal Hearbeat" (before most women even realize they're pregnant)

Georgia
S. Carolina
Texas
Idaho
N. Dakota

No Exceptions Total Ban

Oklahoma
Utah
Arizona

Abortions providers have closed down completely in many of these states. Either they're just outlawed or they're not willing to risk litigation for providing services. The argument that none of this matters because people can go out of state to have an abortion ignores so many crucial details it is amazing people can be so obtuse. Not everyone can afford to travel out of state, and providers in Blue states will be more than overwhelmed.

[Gunnar]

Abortions providers have closed down completely in many of these states. Either they're just outlawed or they're not willing to risk litigation for providing services. The argument that none of this matters because people can go out of state to have an abortion ignores so many crucial details it is amazing people can be so obtuse. Not everyone can afford to travel out of state, and providers in Blue states will be more than overwhelmed.

Besides that, some of these states have proposed or may even have passed laws prohibiting women from going out of state to have an abortion.

I would not be greatly surprised to see attempts to pass laws restricting or even prohibiting D&Cs even for women not pregnant. My wife, years ago, had a severe problem with excessive menstrual bleeding due to fibroids in her uterus that darn near killed her. A D&C saved her life. Are they also going to try to prohibit lifesaving hysterectomies for women who desperately need them? Will hysterectomy be viewed by some of these idiots as merely another method of contraception, which is yet another thing some of them are hoping to eventually restrict or outlaw?

[Morley]

Binger, I don't think you're right. When Roe was decided, abortion--by definition--became a constitutional right. Now that Dobbs has been decided, it's no longer a protected right. That's how the Constitution works.

Right or wrong, some people are upset that a constitutionally protected right has been taken away.

I do not see it or understand it that way. Thanks for the explanation Morley. I understand your point.

Thank you for your response, Binger.

You’re saying that you don’t see it that way. I’m interested in understanding your point of view.

I can’t very well say that I believe in the Constitution, but that I think the document itself is mistaken in how we should interpret it. If we don’t allow the Constitution to define its own processes and procedures, what do we rely on as valid definitions?

[honorentheos]

The opinion of the court, Thomas and Kavanaugh's opinion that is a push to go even further, and even the dissenting opinions are, in my opinion, political.

It says something that only Chief Justice Roberts seems to have any interest in judicial neutrality. His opinion concurring with the judgment but not the opinion of the court is a worthy read. One can look it up but I'll share it below with only minimal reformatting for which I apologize.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS, concurring in the judgment.
We granted certiorari to decide one question: “Whether
all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are un-
constitutional.” Pet. for Cert. i. That question is directly
implicated here: Mississippi’s Gestational Age Act, Miss.
Code Ann. §41–41–191 (2018), generally prohibits abortion
after the fifteenth week of pregnancy—several weeks before
a fetus is regarded as “viable” outside the womb. In urging
our review, Mississippi stated that its case was “an ideal
vehicle” to “reconsider the bright-line viability rule,” and
that a judgment in its favor would “not require the Court to
overturn” Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113 (1973), and Planned
Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey, 505 U. S. 833
(1992). Pet. for Cert. 5.
Today, the Court nonetheless rules for Mississippi by do-
ing just that. I would take a more measured course. I agree
with the Court that the viability line established by Roe and
Casey should be discarded under a straightforward stare de-
cisis analysis. That line never made any sense. Our abor-
tion precedents describe the right at issue as a woman’s
right to choose to terminate her pregnancy. That right
should therefore extend far enough to ensure a reasonable
opportunity to choose, but need not extend any further— certainly not all the way to viability. Mississippi’s law al-
lows a woman three months to obtain an abortion, well be-
yond the point at which it is considered “late” to discover a
pregnancy. See A. Ayoola, Late Recognition of Unintended
Pregnancies, 32 Pub. Health Nursing 462 (2015) (preg-
nancy is discoverable and ordinarily discovered by six
weeks of gestation). I see no sound basis for questioning
the adequacy of that opportunity.
But that is all I would say, out of adherence to a simple
yet fundamental principle of judicial restraint: If it is not
necessary to decide more to dispose of a case, then it is nec-
essary not to decide more. Perhaps we are not always per-
fect in following that command, and certainly there are
cases that warrant an exception. But this is not one of
them. Surely we should adhere closely to principles of judi-
cial restraint here, where the broader path the Court
chooses entails repudiating a constitutional right we have
not only previously recognized, but also expressly reaf-
firmed applying the doctrine of stare decisis. The Court’s
opinion is thoughtful and thorough, but those virtues can-
not compensate for the fact that its dramatic and conse-
quential ruling is unnecessary to decide the case before us.

I.
Let me begin with my agreement with the Court, on the
only question we need decide here: whether to retain the
rule from Roe and Casey that a woman’s right to terminate
her pregnancy extends up to the point that the fetus is re-
garded as “viable” outside the womb. I agree that this rule
should be discarded.
First, this Court seriously erred in Roe in adopting via-
bility as the earliest point at which a State may legislate to
advance its substantial interests in the area of abortion.
See ante, at 50–53. Roe set forth a rigid three-part frame-
work anchored to viability, which more closely resembled a
regulatory code than a body of constitutional law. That framework, moreover, came out of thin air. Neither the
Texas statute challenged in Roe nor the Georgia statute at
issue in its companion case, Doe v. Bolton, 410 U. S. 179
(1973), included any gestational age limit. No party or ami-
cus asked the Court to adopt a bright line viability rule.
And as for Casey, arguments for or against the viability rule
played only a de minimis role in the parties’ briefing and in
the oral argument. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 17–18, 51 (fleeting
discussion of the viability rule).
It is thus hardly surprising that neither Roe nor Casey
made a persuasive or even colorable argument for why the
time for terminating a pregnancy must extend to viability.
The Court’s jurisprudence on this issue is a textbook illus-
tration of the perils of deciding a question neither presented
nor briefed. As has been often noted, Roe’s defense of the
line boiled down to the circular assertion that the State’s
interest is compelling only when an unborn child can live
outside the womb, because that is when the unborn child
can live outside the womb. See 410 U. S., at 163–164; see
also J. Ely, The Wages of Crying Wolf: A Comment on Roe
v. Wade, 82 Yale L. J. 920, 924 (1973) (Roe’s reasoning “mis-
takes a definition for a syllogism”).
Twenty years later, the best defense of the viability line
the Casey plurality could conjure up was workability. See
505 U. S., at 870. But see ante, at 53 (opinion of the Court)
(discussing the difficulties in applying the viability stand-
ard). Although the plurality attempted to add more content
by opining that “it might be said that a woman who fails to
act before viability has consented to the State’s intervention
on behalf of the developing child,” Casey, 505 U. S., at 870,
that mere suggestion provides no basis for choosing viabil-
ity as the critical tipping point. A similar implied consent
argument could be made with respect to a law banning
abortions after fifteen weeks, well beyond the point at
which nearly all women are aware that they are pregnant,
A. Ayoola, M. Nettleman, M. Stommel, & R. Canady, Time of Pregnancy Recognition and Prenatal Care Use: A Popu-
lation-based Study in the United States 39 (2010) (Preg-
nancy Recognition). The dissent, which would retain the
viability line, offers no justification for it either.
This Court’s jurisprudence since Casey, moreover, has
“eroded” the “underpinnings” of the viability line, such as
they were. United States v. Gaudin, 515 U. S. 506, 521
(1995). The viability line is a relic of a time when we recog-
nized only two state interests warranting regulation of
abortion: maternal health and protection of “potential life.”
Roe, 410 U. S., at 162–163. That changed with Gonzales v.
Carhart, 550 U. S. 124 (2007). There, we recognized a
broader array of interests, such as drawing “a bright line
that clearly distinguishes abortion and infanticide,” main-
taining societal ethics, and preserving the integrity of the
medical profession. Id., at 157–160. The viability line has
nothing to do with advancing such permissible goals. Cf.
id., at 171 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting) (Gonzales “blur[red]
the line, firmly drawn in Casey, between previability and
postviability abortions”); see also R. Beck, Gonzales, Casey,
and the Viability Rule, 103 Nw. U. L. Rev. 249, 276–279
(2009).
Consider, for example, statutes passed in a number of ju-
risdictions that forbid abortions after twenty weeks of preg-
nancy, premised on the theory that a fetus can feel pain at
that stage of development. See, e.g., Ala. Code §26–23B–2
(2018). Assuming that prevention of fetal pain is a legiti-
mate state interest after Gonzales, there seems to be no rea-
son why viability would be relevant to the permissibility of
such laws. The same is true of laws designed to “protect
the integrity and ethics of the medical profession” and re-
strict procedures likely to “coarsen society” to the “dignity
of human life.” Gonzales, 550 U. S., at 157. Mississippi’s
law, for instance, was premised in part on the legislature’s
finding that the “dilation and evacuation” procedure is a
“barbaric practice, dangerous for the maternal patient, and demeaning to the medical profession.” Miss. Code Ann.
§41–41–191(2)(b)(i)(8). That procedure accounts for most
abortions performed after the first trimester—two weeks
before the period at issue in this case—and “involves the
use of surgical instruments to crush and tear the unborn
child apart.” Ibid.; see also Gonzales, 550 U. S., at 135.
Again, it would make little sense to focus on viability when
evaluating a law based on these permissible goals.
In short, the viability rule was created outside the ordi-
nary course of litigation, is and always has been completely
unreasoned, and fails to take account of state interests
since recognized as legitimate. It is indeed “telling that
other countries almost uniformly eschew” a viability line.
Ante, at 53 (opinion of the Court). Only a handful of coun-
tries, among them China and North Korea, permit elective
abortions after twenty weeks; the rest have coalesced
around a 12–week line. See The World’s Abortion Laws,
Center for Reproductive Rights (Feb. 23, 2021) (online
source archived at www.supremecourt.gov) (Canada,
China, Iceland, Guinea-Bissau, the Netherlands, North Ko-
rea, Singapore, and Vietnam permit elective abortions after
twenty weeks). The Court rightly rejects the arbitrary via-
bility rule today.

Ii.
None of this, however, requires that we also take the dra-
matic step of altogether eliminating the abortion right first
recognized in Roe. Mississippi itself previously argued as
much to this Court in this litigation.
When the State petitioned for our review, its basic re-
quest was straightforward: “clarify whether abortion prohi-
bitions before viability are always unconstitutional.” Pet.
for Cert. 14. The State made a number of strong arguments
that the answer is no, id., at 15–26—arguments that, as
discussed, I find persuasive. And it went out of its way to
make clear that it was not asking the Court to repudiate entirely the right to choose whether to terminate a preg-
nancy: “To be clear, the questions presented in this petition
do not require the Court to overturn Roe or Casey.” Id., at
5. Mississippi tempered that statement with an oblique
one-sentence footnote intimating that, if the Court could
not reconcile Roe and Casey with current facts or other
cases, it “should not retain erroneous precedent.” Pet. for
Cert. 5–6, n. 1. But the State never argued that we should
grant review for that purpose.
After we granted certiorari, however, Mississippi
changed course. In its principal brief, the State bluntly an-
nounced that the Court should overrule Roe and Casey. The
Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion, it ar-
gued, and a State should be able to prohibit elective abor-
tions if a rational basis supports doing so. See Brief for Pe-
titioners 12–13.
The Court now rewards that gambit, noting three times
that the parties presented “no half-measures” and argued
that “we must either reaffirm or overrule Roe and Casey.”
Ante, at 5, 8, 72. Given those two options, the majority picks
the latter.
This framing is not accurate. In its brief on the merits,
Mississippi in fact argued at length that a decision simply
rejecting the viability rule would result in a judgment in its
favor. See Brief for Petitioners 5, 38–48. But even if the
State had not argued as much, it would not matter. There
is no rule that parties can confine this Court to disposing of
their case on a particular ground—let alone when review
was sought and granted on a different one. Our established
practice is instead not to “formulate a rule of constitutional
law broader than is required by the precise facts to which it
is to be applied.” Washington State Grange v. Washington
State Republican Party, 552 U. S. 442, 450 (2008) (quoting
Ashwander v. TVA, 297 U. S. 288, 347 (1936) (Brandeis, J.,
concurring)); see also United States v. Raines, 362 U. S. 17,
21 (1960).
Following that “fundamental principle of judicial re-
straint,” Washington State Grange, 552 U. S., at 450, we
should begin with the narrowest basis for disposition, pro-
ceeding to consider a broader one only if necessary to re-
solve the case at hand. See, e.g., Office of Personnel Man-
agement v. Richmond, 496 U. S. 414, 423 (1990). It is only
where there is no valid narrower ground of decision that we
should go on to address a broader issue, such as whether a
constitutional decision should be overturned. See Federal
Election Comm’n v. Wisconsin Right to Life, Inc., 551 U. S.
449, 482 (2007) (declining to address the claim that a con-
stitutional decision should be overruled when the appellant
prevailed on its narrower constitutional argument).
Here, there is a clear path to deciding this case correctly
without overruling Roe all the way down to the studs: rec-
ognize that the viability line must be discarded, as the ma-
jority rightly does, and leave for another day whether to re-
ject any right to an abortion at all. See Webster v.
Reproductive Health Services, 492 U. S. 490, 518, 521
(1989) (plurality opinion) (rejecting Roe’s viability line as
“rigid” and “indeterminate,” while also finding “no occasion
to revisit the holding of Roe” that, under the Constitution,
a State must provide an opportunity to choose to terminate
a pregnancy).
Of course, such an approach would not be available if the
rationale of Roe and Casey was inextricably entangled with
and dependent upon the viability standard. It is not. Our
precedents in this area ground the abortion right in a
woman’s “right to choose.” See Carey v. Population Services
Int’l, 431 U. S. 678, 688–689 (1977) (“underlying foundation
of the holdings” in Roe and Griswold v. Connecticut, 381
U. S. 479 (1965), was the “right of decision in matters of
childbearing”); Maher v. Roe, 432 U. S. 464, 473 (1977) (Roe
and other cases “recognize a constitutionally protected in-
terest in making certain kinds of important decisions free
from governmental compulsion” (internal quotation marks omitted)); id., at 473–474 (Roe “did not declare an unquali-
fied constitutional right to an abortion,” but instead pro-
tected “the woman from unduly burdensome interference
with her freedom to decide whether to terminate her preg-
nancy” (internal quotation marks omitted)); Webster, 492
U. S., at 520 (plurality opinion) (Roe protects “the claims of
a woman to decide for herself whether or not to abort a fetus
she is carrying”); Gonzales, 550 U. S., at 146 (a State may
not “prohibit any woman from making the ultimate decision
to terminate her pregnancy”). If that is the basis for Roe,
Roe’s viability line should be scrutinized from the same per-
spective. And there is nothing inherent in the right to
choose that requires it to extend to viability or any other
point, so long as a real choice is provided. See Webster, 492
U. S., at 519 (plurality opinion) (finding no reason “why the
State’s interest in protecting potential human life should
come into existence only at the point of viability”).
To be sure, in reaffirming the right to an abortion, Casey
termed the viability rule Roe’s “central holding.” 505 U. S.,
at 860. Other cases of ours have repeated that language.
See, e.g., Gonzales, 550 U. S., at 145–146. But simply de-
claring it does not make it so. The question in Roe was
whether there was any right to abortion in the Constitu-
tion. See Brief for Appellants and Brief for Appellees, in
Roe v. Wade, O. T. 1971, No. 70–18. How far the right ex-
tended was a concern that was separate and subsidiary,
and—not surprisingly—entirely unbriefed.
The Court in Roe just chose to address both issues in one
opinion: It first recognized a right to “choose to terminate
a pregnancy” under the Constitution, see 410 U. S., at
129–159, and then, having done so, explained that a line
should be drawn at viability such that a State could not pro-
scribe abortion before that period, see id., at 163. The via-
bility line is a separate rule fleshing out the metes and
bounds of Roe’s core holding. Applying principles of stare
decisis, I would excise that additional rule—and only that rule—from our jurisprudence.
The majority lists a number of cases that have stressed
the importance of the viability rule to our abortion prece-
dents. See ante, at 73–74. I agree that—whether it was
originally holding or dictum—the viability line is clearly
part of our “past precedent,” and the Court has applied it as
such in several cases since Roe. Ante, at 73. My point is
that Roe adopted two distinct rules of constitutional law:
one, that a woman has the right to choose to terminate a
pregnancy; two, that such right may be overridden by the
State’s legitimate interests when the fetus is viable outside
the womb. The latter is obviously distinct from the former.
I would abandon that timing rule, but see no need in this
case to consider the basic right.
The Court contends that it is impossible to address Roe’s
conclusion that the Constitution protects the woman’s right
to abortion, without also addressing Roe’s rule that the
State’s interests are not constitutionally adequate to justify
a ban on abortion until viability. See ibid. But we have
partially overruled precedents before, see, e.g., United
States v. Miller, 471 U. S. 130, 142–144 (1985); Daniels v.
Williams, 474 U. S. 327, 328–331 (1986); Batson v. Ken-
tucky, 476 U. S. 79, 90–93 (1986), and certainly have never
held that a distinct holding defining the contours of a con-
stitutional right must be treated as part and parcel of the
right itself.
Overruling the subsidiary rule is sufficient to resolve this
case in Mississippi’s favor. The law at issue allows abor-
tions up through fifteen weeks, providing an adequate op-
portunity to exercise the right Roe protects. By the time a
pregnant woman has reached that point, her pregnancy is
well into the second trimester. Pregnancy tests are now in-
expensive and accurate, and a woman ordinarily discovers
she is pregnant by six weeks of gestation. See A. Branum
& K. Ahrens, Trends in Timing of Pregnancy Awareness
Among US Women, 21 Maternal & Child Health J. 715, 722 (2017). Almost all know by the end of the first trimester.
Pregnancy Recognition 39. Safe and effective abortifa-
cients, moreover, are now readily available, particularly
during those early stages. See I. Adibi et al., Abortion, 22
Geo. J. Gender & L. 279, 303 (2021). Given all this, it is no
surprise that the vast majority of abortions happen in the
first trimester. See Centers for Disease Control and Pre-
vention, Abortion Surveillance—United States 1 (2020).
Presumably most of the remainder would also take place
earlier if later abortions were not a legal option. Ample ev-
idence thus suggests that a 15-week ban provides sufficient
time, absent rare circumstances, for a woman “to decide for
herself ” whether to terminate her pregnancy. Webster, 492
U. S., at 520 (plurality opinion).

III.
Whether a precedent should be overruled is a question
“entirely within the discretion of the court.” Hertz v. Wood-
man, 218 U. S. 205, 212 (1910); see also Payne v. Tennessee,
501 U. S. 808, 828 (1991) (stare decisis is a “principle of pol-
icy”). In my respectful view, the sound exercise of that dis-
cretion should have led the Court to resolve the case on the
narrower grounds set forth above, rather than overruling
Roe and Casey entirely. The Court says there is no “princi-
pled basis” for this approach, ante, at 73, but in fact it is
firmly grounded in basic principles of stare decisis and judi-
cial restraint.

The Court’s decision to overrule Roe and Casey is a seri-
ous jolt to the legal system—regardless of how you view
those cases. A narrower decision rejecting the misguided
viability line would be markedly less unsettling, and noth-
ing more is needed to decide this case.
Our cases say that the effect of overruling a precedent on
reliance interests is a factor to consider in deciding whether
to take such a step, and respondents argue that generations
of women have relied on the right to an abortion in organ-
izing their relationships and planning their futures. Brief
for Respondents 36–41; see also Casey, 505 U. S., at 856
(making the same point). The Court questions whether
these concerns are pertinent under our precedents, see
ante, at 64–65, but the issue would not even arise with a
decision rejecting only the viability line: It cannot reasona-
bly be argued that women have shaped their lives in part
on the assumption that they would be able to abort up to
viability, as opposed to fifteen weeks.
In support of its holding, the Court cites three seminal
constitutional decisions that involved overruling prior prec-
edents: Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483 (1954),
West Virginia Bd. of Ed. v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624 (1943),
and West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, 300 U. S. 379 (1937).
See ante, at 40–41. The opinion in Brown was unanimous
and eleven pages long; this one is neither. Barnette was
decided only three years after the decision it overruled,
three Justices having had second thoughts. And West Coast
Hotel was issued against a backdrop of unprecedented eco-
nomic despair that focused attention on the fundamental
flaws of existing precedent. It also was part of a sea change
in this Court’s interpretation of the Constitution, “sig-
nal[ing] the demise of an entire line of important prece-
dents,” ante, at 40—a feature the Court expressly disclaims
in today’s decision, see ante, at 32, 66. None of these lead-
ing cases, in short, provides a template for what the Court
does today.

The Court says we should consider whether to overrule
Roe and Casey now, because if we delay we would be forced
to consider the issue again in short order. See ante, at 76–
77. There would be “turmoil” until we did so, according to
the Court, because of existing state laws with “shorter
deadlines or no deadline at all.” Ante, at 76. But under the
narrower approach proposed here, state laws outlawing
abortion altogether would still violate binding precedent.
And to the extent States have laws that set the cutoff date
earlier than fifteen weeks, any litigation over that
timeframe would proceed free of the distorting effect that
the viability rule has had on our constitutional debate. The
same could be true, for that matter, with respect to legisla-
tive consideration in the States. We would then be free to
exercise our discretion in deciding whether and when to
take up the issue, from a more informed perspective.
* * *
Both the Court’s opinion and the dissent display a relent-
less freedom from doubt on the legal issue that I cannot
share. I am not sure, for example, that a ban on terminat-
ing a pregnancy from the moment of conception must be
treated the same under the Constitution as a ban after fif-
teen weeks. A thoughtful Member of this Court once coun-
seled that the difficulty of a question “admonishes us to ob-
serve the wise limitations on our function and to confine
ourselves to deciding only what is necessary to the disposi-
tion of the immediate case.” Whitehouse v. Illinois Central
R. Co., 349 U. S. 366, 372–373 (1955) (Frankfurter, J., for
the Court). I would decide the question we granted review
to answer—whether the previously recognized abortion
right bars all abortion restrictions prior to viability, such
that a ban on abortions after fifteen weeks of pregnancy is
necessarily unlawful. The answer to that question is no,
and there is no need to go further to decide this case.
I therefore concur only in the judgment.

[Binger]

I do not see it or understand it that way. Thanks for the explanation Morley. I understand your point.

Thank you for your response, Binger.

You’re saying that you don’t see it that way. I’m interested in understanding your point of view.

I can’t very well say that I believe in the Constitution, but that I think the document itself is mistaken in how we should interpret it. If we don’t allow the Constitution to define its own processes and procedures, what do we rely on as valid definitions?

I not sure what that means to "believe in the Constitution." Way back in the day, I said I believed in God and all kind of stuff. I don't do that any more.

The constitution is a framework for our laws, process and rights. I think, more often than not, it gets shredded and abused more than it gets used. If the original document caught on fire today and we had to start over, I doubt it would have much of an effect other than selling clicks and views to consumers. But since we have the constitution and we are using it - it does not mention abortion. Any rights that exist may be extrapolated from other things, but meh, whatever, it does not say abortion. So, everyone can go back to their own towns and states and figure out how to have their own body and make their own choices.

On Roe and abortion and the court. My take is simple. I believe in "my body my choice" and the last person or entity in the world that I trust to either tolerate my choice or respect my body - is a federal government. I am fine if the feds stick to the constitutionality of things and leave the lawmaking to the states. I am not interested in a government that is run by Schumer/Biden one day and McConnell on another day making decisions for bodies and choices.

On abortion, the service. I think it should be legal everywhere.

On what just happened. Well, no crap Sherlock. Of course this happened. There were some smart people that thought the Roe decision was problematic and now the states can do whatever the hell they want. Are we still pretending that the vaccine passports and "your body but not your choice" orders for the last 2 years did not have an impact on this, or nah? I expect there will be more rulings coming up where the decision making get returned to the states.

[honorentheos]

While I suspect he is motivated to protect the court from attacks that it has been politicized (which it clearly has), I can't say I disagree that the argument around the line of viability outside the womb is not a bright line that determines personhood. It's just difficult to find a different one that is scientifically defendable. He doesn't use the term personhood to my recollection as he argues the right to choose should have been protected but how long after conception is sufficient to have a viable choice is his metric it seems. It says the court is there to decide the question of where a state has an interest that supercedes that of a woman's when it comes to the decision to terminate a pregnancy but argues the line is after conception still. The right that was removed being that of a "constitutionally protected interest in making certain kinds of important decisions free from governmental compulsion."

Welp. Democracy was a nice idea while it lasted anyway. An independent judiciary being central to said democracy of course.

[Morley]

Thank you for your response, Binger.

You’re saying that you don’t see it that way. I’m interested in understanding your point of view.

I can’t very well say that I believe in the Constitution, but that I think the document itself is mistaken in how we should interpret it. If we don’t allow the Constitution to define its own processes and procedures, what do we rely on as valid definitions?

I not sure what that means to "believe in the Constitution." Way back in the day, I said I believed in God and all kind of stuff. I don't do that any more.

Let me expand that sentence: I can’t very well say that I believe in the Constitution as the foundational law of the land, but that I think the document itself is mistaken in how we should interpret it. If we don’t allow the Constitution to define its own processes and procedures, what do we rely on as valid definitions?

You kind of skipped over responding to this.

You can't say something is not constitutional when the constitution itself defines what makes a things constitutional.

By definition, both Roe and Dobbs were constitutional, whether anyone thinks they should have been decided that way or not.

The constitution is a framework for our laws, process and rights. I think, more often than not, it gets shredded and abused more than it gets used. If the original document caught on fire today and we had to start over, I doubt it would have much of an effect other than selling clicks and views to consumers. But since we have the constitution and we are using it - it does not mention abortion. Any rights that exist may be extrapolated from other things, but meh, whatever, it does not say abortion. So, everyone can go back to their own towns and states and figure out how to have their own body and make their own choices.

You talking about what you think should have happened. Not about what did happen.

On Roe and abortion and the court. My take is simple. I believe in "my body my choice" and the last person or entity in the world that I trust to either tolerate my choice or respect my body - is a federal government. I am fine if the feds stick to the constitutionality of things and leave the lawmaking to the states. I am not interested in a government that is run by Schumer/Biden one day and McConnell on another day making decisions for bodies and choices.

On abortion, the service. I think it should be legal everywhere.

I see your point. Personally, I trust the Feds before I trust the states.

On what just happened. Well, no crap Sherlock. Of course this happened. There were some smart people that thought the Roe decision was problematic and now the states can do whatever the hell they want. Are we still pretending that the vaccine passports and "your body but not your choice" orders for the last 2 years did not have an impact on this, or nah? I expect there will be more rulings coming up where the decision making get returned to the states.

I'm not pretending anything. This isn't part of what I'm arguing.