SCOTUS LOOKS TO OVERTURN ROE V. WADE: FOR AND AGAINST

On May 2, 2022 a Politico reporter leaked a draft written by Justice Samuel Alito (R) of the Supreme Court of the United States that is looking to overturn the case of Roe v. Wade. 

Roe v. Wade is the court decision made in 1973 that protects the rights to abortions in the United States. If this is overturned, then it would mean that there is no constitutional right to decide on if a woman can end their pregnancy or not. It would then be up to the individual States’ governments to either deny or expand access to abortions.

This draft was being prepared after Mississippi tried issuing a law in 2018 which would have banned abortions after 15 weeks. When the state was rejected, they appealed the decision to the Supreme Court.

The leak also indicates that there are five of nine of the Supreme Court Justices who agree with Alito’s draft. With this, the question of whether or not the Supreme Court remains unbiased emerged. There is now fear that the Justices can be swayed by public pressure.

Although the decision will not be made for a couple months, there is uproar from both sides of the political spectrum. 

For: 

For those in favor of this decision, generally believe that abortion is not a protected right based on the Constitution. 

They argue that the 14th Amendment does not specifically state that abortion falls under equal protection. This means that the government would be able to deny access to legal abortion.

Alito (R) states in his draft, “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start. Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences.” 

A Cypress College student who would prefer to remain anonymous talks about their views on the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

They believe that since abortion ends the life of a fetus it is muder. This view is based on the Unborn Victims of Violence Act which recognizes the unborn fetus as human and is protected by certain crimes. 

By overturning Roe v. Wade, it is believed that the country will be able to go back to “our nation’s history and traditions” and the start to a new era. 

Against:

On the opposite end, those against overturning Roe v. Wade believe that this ruling holds women’s constitutional right to choose whether or not to have an abortion. 

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D) issued a joint statement on May 2nd after the release. 

The statement said, “The Republican-appointed Justices’ reported voices to overturn Roe v. Wade would go down as an abomination, one of the worst and most damaging decisions in modern history.”

Gabriel Gonzalez, a former student at Cypress College who now works in the Photography Department, talks about his stance on the leak.

“I think it’s a travesty… The good thing about being pro-choice is you can choose whether you want to (have an abortion) or not. And taking that away will cause a lot of problems… 

You would see a lot more women dying just finding a way to get an abortion. People do crazy stuff when they don’t have access to safe and accessible medical care,” Gonzalez says. 

This potential ruling is believed to be taking away rights that women have to their own bodies, creating the idea of the “war on women.”