U.S. Supreme Court overturns protections for abortion
Are you aware that on July 24, 2022, the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade’s ruling, which provided constitutional protection for abortion in the country for nearly 50 years?
The case was opened by Norma McCorvey, known by the legal pseudonym «Jane Roe», who in 1969 became pregnant with her third child. McCorvey wanted to have an abortion, but she lived in Texas, where abortion was illegal, except when it was necessary to save her mother’s life.
Her attorneys filed a lawsuit on her behalf in U.S. federal court against her local district attorney, Henry Wade, alleging that Texas’s abortion laws were unconstitutional. A three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas ruled in her favor and declared the relevant Texas abortion statutes unconstitutional.
That original 1973 Roe v. Wade decision ruling found that a woman’s decision to terminate a pregnancy was protected by the right to privacy that flows from the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which protects a citizen’s right to «life, liberty and property.»
«The constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision,»wrote conservative associate Justice Samuel Alito.
The state could only interfere with that right, the court found, after a fetus reached the «viability» stage, around 22 to 24 weeks of pregnancy, when the fetus could be considered viable outside the womb.
Rather, individual state legislatures will now decide how to regulate the medical procedure and to what extent they want to allow, restrict or ban it outright.
Roughly half the states in the U.S. (13), have already signalled that they will likely move quickly to ban abortion or restrict access to it to some degree.
In the United States, protests began on both sides — supporters and opponents of abortion.
What do you think about this? Was this the right decision? Have you ever had an unwanted pregnancy?
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