Aborting Roe v Wade
On the 30th anniversary of Roe vs.Wade, as many if not the majority of Americans
take to the streets in joy I submit to you the Roe v Wade decision was a horrible
decision; in fact its one of the worst legal writings in the history of the Supreme
Court.
That thesis alone will put most of you in a tailspin but before you get
all your political spins moving about let me stop you there and tell you I dont base
my argument much on morality or womens rights issues...both of which are what clearly
demonstrates the fallacy of the
Roe v Wade decision in the first place. My argument
against Roe is primarily based on the fact that the decision is "bad law."
For
those of you unfamiliar with some of the Roe v Wade background here is a review.
Roe
v Wade generally speaking, was based on a woman in the state of Texas who challenged
a Texas state statute which prohibited abortions . The woman sued the state of Texas
on the constitutionality of the statute and claimed by not being given access to
abortion services she was refused/denied services and denied her right to privacy
thus violating her 1st, 9th and 14th amendment rights. The case was brought before
the Supreme Court in 1973 where by a vote of 7 to 2 the court ruled in favor of the
woman.
Justice Blackmon wrote the majority opinion for the court and from here
is where the flaw in legal prescription begins.
The decision covered 3 issues.
A womans right to choice, the right to privacy, and the rights and interests of the
state in potential life and public health.
If you read Justice Blackmons interpretation
(yes i have read it) you'll find in the second paragraph that the the Justice points
out that the interpretation of the law need be clear of "emotion" and "predilection."
He clearly didnt keep the decision free of politics as in his following paragraph
he reflects on social ills of population growth, poverty and pollution; thus from
the opening paragraph the Justice admitted political overtures in the decision and
thus did NOT stay clear of emotions and predilections and in fact he contradicted
himself in the opening paragraph of the majority opinion.
From a more legal standpoint,
Justice Blackmon determined a woman has a constitutional right to choose whether
or not to carry a pregnancy to term yet he then went on to say in the ruling that
individual rights are not absolute and in fact can be curbed and/or limited.
We
know this to be a fact in prior cases as well as common law. The complete sovereignty
over ones body has never been upheld in strict scrutiny; that is to say with no infringements
whatsoever..this is where Justice Blackmon gets creative with the interpretation
of law, for example... one can not run nude in public, a person cannot inject narcotics
into their bloodstream, as Justice Oliver Wendall Holmes pointed out years prior,
one cannot yell "fire" in a crowded theater when in fact there is no fire.
These forementioned things are not constitutional freedoms as they pose "clear
and present danger" to other people and other peoples potential freedoms and
liberties thus individual rights such as speech and choice can in fact be limited
when they present a danger to someone else's liberties and individual rights.
Thus
Justice Blackmon contradicts himself saying the the right to choose is a constitutional
right yet also says it can be restricted.
This is where Justice Blackmon gets
creative and turns his attention to the unborn "fetus." Justice Blackmon
researches medical science at the time and concluded the fetus as an "unviable
tissue mass." Justice Blackmon utilized the 3 stage trimester approach and via
science of the time it was conventionally held that a mother "felt life"
during the second trimester (defined in the ruling at 28 weeks) and thus at that
point on is where life occurs and from that point the state has a "potential
interest in life" and can place limitations from there.
This too is a flawed
analogy and rather arrogant to assume medical science knew as much as it would ever
know about the unborn and technology and science would never gain more insightful
knowledge. Through sonagram and medical technology we can specifically trace the
human development of the fetus at first trimester stages and its more and more common
place for 7 month old premature births to survive and become quite normal and healthy.
Justice Blackmon assumes the 6 to 7 month stage is the beginning of life when its
clearly medically evident that a fetus is well developed by this time. Furthermore,
the idea of that which is "unviable" is arbitrary if not again, rather
arrogant. A new born child carried to full term could be construed as unviable if
defined under Justice Blackmons opinion. A newborn cannot care for itself or feed
itself, without proper care it would die no different than a 7 month old fetus...
neither can sustain life on its own thus the unviable argument is rather simplistic
and seemingly cold.
In terms of the states interest in potential life I think
Justice O'Conner brilliantly wrote in a dissent involving a later case along the
lines of Roe v Wade that in fact with the medical technology available today that
the trimester approach used in Roe v Wade is highly flawed and in fact the state
has a public health interest in its citizens "throughout the pregnancy"
and not just as of the fourth month.
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Thus we see that Roe v Wade from its
outset and as stated by its majority writer Justice Blackmon was not clear of political
motives, was not applied as a practice of law, it contradicted itself when he did
try to apply the law because he expanded the constitutional interpretation and then
confessed its limitations... and is contradicted again by the advancments made in
medical technology over the last 30 years.
Interestingly enough when the court
has had the opportunity to overturn Roe v Wade it has elected not to do so. I think
Justice O'Conner wrote a brilliant dissent concerning Roe v Wade yet she in essence
"wimped out" in overturning the law based on the legal concept of "stare
decisis" which means build rulings with respect to previous rulings.
I believe
the court has not overturned Roe because they dont know what to replace it with.
The modern day court knows the Roe ruling is a legal fallacy but the problem is what
to replace it with.
I think Roe v Wade should be overturned, in fact it should've
never been written.
Law cannot dictate morality and abortion is a moral issue.
Individual freedoms with no limitations would be anarchy, the constitution never
expressly states specified rights of privacy nor does it specifically qualify who
is or is not included in the definition of life.
You may interpret a fetus as
you wish however each and every one of us is a result of that so-called unviable
tissue mass, and there is nothing in the constitution which guarantees women access
to public health for aborting a fetus. This comes about via equal access for prenatal
care along with abortion care however this clause only works because the Roe decision
claims the fetus isnt life and we have long since known this is a flawed analogy.
*
A
womans right to choose exists in the same precept as any mans right to choose, the
right to choice is protected prior to the pregnancy, not after the fact. The resulting
pregnancy doesnt deal with choice rather it deals with consequence of choices one
made prior to.
This isnt to say that women should be locked into a room and forced
to carry their pregnancy to term.
Abortion is an issue of morality and public
health, not of constitutional rights and law.
There are clearly cases where an
abortion procedure may be necessary though I dont think states can simply outlaw
abortion procedures I do think they can limit and guide these procedures through
public health policy which to indulge would be another topic.
There is no fix
or replacement to Roe v Wade, the best lesson Roe serves is that it clearly shows
that abortion is not an issue of constitutional rights, to try to make it such or
to correct it simply leads to more neverending contradictions from a legal standpoint
thus the ruling should be overturned and reverted to the states as a matter of pulic
health policy.