The court’s move will allow more than half of the states to ban abortion, ending 50 years of federal abortion rights and affecting tens of millions of Americans
The Supreme Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade case, holding that there is no longer a federal constitutional right to an abortion. The unprecedented move that ended 50 years of abortion rights will allow more than half of the states to ban abortion, transforming the landscape of women and other people’s reproductive health in America.
What happened?
The Court decided there is no constitutional right to abortion in a case called Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization. In reaching the decision, the conservative-majority court overturned Roe v. Wade in a 5-4 decision. As a result, individual states will be granted the power to ban or severely restrict abortion.
New abortion bans will make the US one of the four nations to roll back on abortion rights since 1944, the other three being Poland, El Salvador and Nicaragua.
Where and when will this happen?
Twenty-six states are expected to do so immediately, or as soon as practicable, making abortion illegal across most of the south and midwest. In at least seven states, state officials say that abortion bans can now be enforced.
Three states – Kentucky, Louisiana and South Dakota – have so-called “trigger laws” that went into effect automatically upon the Supreme Court’s ruling. Ten other states have trigger bans with implementation mechanisms that occur after a set period or after a step taken by a state government entity.
In these states, women and other people who can become pregnant will need to either travel hundreds of miles to reach an abortion provider or self-manage abortion at home through medication or other means.
A final group of states intends to ban abortion very early in pregnancy, after six weeks, which abortion-rights advocates argue is effectively a ban on the procedure, as most people are unaware they are pregnant at that time.
However, anti-abortion laws are not national. The US will have a collection of laws, including restrictions and protections, because Democratic-led states expanded reproductive rights in the run-up to the decision.
Can the federal government stop this?
With 85% of Americans believing abortion should be legal in at least some circumstances and with a broad majority of Americans not supporting the overturning of Roe v. Wade, advocacy groups and political organisations are attempting to find a solution.
The most effective protection against state abortion bans is federal law. Such a law would need the majority support of the House of Representatives, a 60-vote majority in the Senate, and a signature from Joe Biden to pass. A majority of members of the House of Representatives and the White House support an abortion rights statute.
President Joe Biden decried the supreme court’s decision to overturn the right to an abortion, stating that “the Supreme Court [had taken] away a constitutional right from the American people.” He added: “I’m going to do everything in my power I legally can do in terms of protecting abortion, as well as pushing Congress and the public.”
Former President Barack Obama also criticised the overturning, saying the high court not only reversed nearly 50 years of precedent but it "relegated the most intensely personal decision someone can make to the whims of politicians and ideologues -- attacking the essential freedoms of millions of Americans."
However, abortion rights laws would most likely be blocked by Republicans in the Senate, evenly split with Democrats. To overcome the evenly split Senate, Democrats would need to win landslide victories in the upcoming midterm elections.
Who will be most affected by the Supreme Court Decision?
All people will be affected, with pregnancy-related deaths predicted to rise in a country that already has the highest maternal mortality rate of any economically developed country.
“People will have to travel hundreds or thousands of miles to access care, self-manage an abortion outside the healthcare system, or carry a pregnancy to term against their will,” explains educational influencer Blair Imani in one of her recent posts. “Doctors, patients and everyday people who help someone get an abortion could be subject to criminal prosecution. And so can people who use common forms of contraception like IUDs. Even people simply seeking treatment for miscarriages may be subjected to criminal investigations.”
However, because pregnant people of colour have long been marginalised and neglected in the medical system due to racism and discrimination, the bans will disproportionately affect Black, Latine, Indigenous and other people of colour.
One study produced in advance of the decision estimated that at least 100, 000 women would be unable to secure an abortion within the first year of a ban, and 75,000 would give birth as a result.
Cases such as that of a six-week pregnant 10 year-old child rape victim from Ohio who was forced to travel to Indiana for abortion are shedding light on the impact of the ruling.
Does this mean other constitutional rights are at risk?
The overturning of Roe v. Wade could open the door for courts to overturn same-sex marriage, contraception and other rights. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote to call explicitly for other rulings to be revised: “in future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court's substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell,” referring to decisions on contraception, sodomy and same-sex marriage.
Liberal justices suspect that those rulings are now at risk. "The right Roe and Casey recognized does not stand alone," they wrote. "To the contrary, the Court has linked it for decades to other settled freedoms involving bodily integrity, familial relationships, and procreation. Most obviously, the right to terminate a pregnancy arose straight out of the right to purchase and use contraception. In turn, those rights led, more recently, to rights of same-sex intimacy and marriage."
What could the ruling mean for abortion rights on a worldwide scale?
Being one of the most powerful and influential nations globally, many experts believe that it will energise anti-abortion groups internationally, an effect already feared in countries such as Spain and the UK.
“The opinions of the Supreme Court are cited by other courts around the world, so it becomes a way for other nations whose courts may be hostile to abortion to find an international precedent to justify their decision,” reports journalist Jessica Glenza.
She continues explaining how “it curtails the US’ ability to lobby on behalf of the rights of women and girls globally. Because if women and girls cannot obtain a right to abortion in the United States, something that is recognised as a human right by the United Nations, how can our diplomats then go abroad and say ‘you really need to provide for the educational needs of women and girls’ or ‘you really need to provide for the reproductive freedom for women and girls, for contraception, or end the practice of child marriage’? Those topics are going to suddenly become a lot more difficult for the US to be a leader on.”
By Anna Alandete
6 July 2022
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