A Question of Constitutional Authority by Supreme Court

The most recent conflict between the “two Americas” was characterized by the Dobbs v. Jackson decision by the United States Supreme Court this summer, which nullified abortion decisions. Observers who support abortion attempt by the court’s conservative majority to further a conservative agenda that denies pregnant women the freedom to make their own decisions about their bodies. The pro-life movement applauded the court’s long overdue ban on killing the lives of unborn humans.

Each side of the abortion views Dobbs’s verdict through the prism of political arguments without the content of the ruling, as is sometimes the case in disputes where sides lack empathy for one another. The 213-page legal analysis, however, makes three things evident to a detached observer when one overcomes the allure of Dobbs (pleasure news items; alarmist commentary; and -sadly in our day-memes, sound bites, and tweets).

The seeming political reversal of the Roe and Casey decisions by the US Supreme Court depoliticizes the judiciary in the short term and sets the path for the development of abortion rights in the USA over the long term.

Just Supreme Court has the necessary power to decide the claims, Dobbs v. Jackson helps to depoliticize the court. Six justices viewed the topic of abortion from a judicial stance of moderation. The Dobbs majority questioned if the Supreme Court had the jurisdiction to proclaim abortion a legal right in the first place, in contrast to courts that decided on abortion (Roe & Casey).

These justices asked that our checks and balances system necessitates them to ask: “Should laws cure feti as humans?” and “What abortion restrictions should be levied in which step of pregnancies?” before asking prescriptive questions that inexorably invite judgments. Is abortion a legal matter that the United States Supreme Court may decide on?

Given that abortion is not mentioned in the US factors, the Dobbs majority concluded that it is not a right. The Supreme Court may uphold a “right” even though the Constitution does not expressly state it if the practice it upholds has a long history in society and serves as a means of resolving competing interests in a way that promotes public order. Wainwright from 1963, already-existing rights to counsel from capital offenses to all felonies, or Obergefell v. Hodges from 2015, already-existing rights to marry beyond heterosexual couples to homosexual couples.

The Dobbs majority claims that not support Roe v. Wade’s claimed constitutional right to abortion. When the Roe decision was made in 1973, abortion was never prevalent practice in the US, there had been no federal that supported the right to have an abortion, but 200 years of American history had mostly considered abortion as just a criminal act.

The Roe majority derived its right to abortion from the privacy rights of the 1st, 4th, 5th, 9th, and 14th Amendments in the lack of legal and historical Casey court relied on the idea of liberty provided by the 14th Amendment. However, abortion is a too morally significant operation and privacy is just too broad a right to be tied to each other in a fashion that allows for a fair subjection of the opposition’s concerns.

The arbitrary nature of the standards Roe and Casey established made it clear that their justifications were flawed. Although there is no legislative text, rule, or precedent in American law endorsing such criteria, both decisions found a compromise between the conflicting interests of feta & expectant women.

Furthermore, Casey’s ambiguous “undue hardship” clause made consistent enforcement impractical. The court’s support of abortion rights needed to be repealed as a result because it was judicial overreach and “an egregious error on a crash course with the Charter from the moment [it] was determined.”

The Proper Role of the Supreme Courts

United States Supreme Court is not the authorized authority to regulate abortion, according to the main argument in Dobbs v. Jackson. The US Constitution does not mention abortion, hence the court cannot control abortion without inventing arbitrary rules (such as viability or trimester thresholds). The federal judiciary of the US government should not usurp the legislative branch’s authority to make policy, because doing would be undesirable. The American people’s right to democratic self-determination would be taken away if the US Supreme Court, a court made up of nine political appointees, electorally unaccountable controlled a topic like abortion under the pretense of interpretation.

State representatives of the people are now authorized to regulate abortion because federal law cannot be created without court approval. The Dobbs v. Jackson case strengthens America’s reputation as a bold experiment in decentralized democracy.

The ruling might be seen as returning to the Tenth Amendment’s idea of democracy, which is consistent with that experiment. When seen in this context, the Dobbs decision should not be marred by unhelpful assumptions about the intentions of the “conservative” judges on the bench or even detrimental effects on many pregnant women.

An Unconventional Prediction (Supreme Court)

It is possible that in the long term, Dobbs’s decision may result in an increase in abortion rights across the country. By making abortion a legislatively judicially regulated one, state governments are free to impose any restrictions on abortion they deem appropriate.

There are now fewer limitations on abortion in 17 states with Democratic majorities in both Republican Party holds a tenuous majority in only one chamber (such as Virginia, Minnesota, or Alaska). While this also implies that abortion can be banned in all stages of pregnancy in 29 additional states with Republican-majority legislatures, I anticipate a future for abortion in America that is more, not less, permissive.

This illogical forecast is supported by Americans’ shared political and cultural past. The American ethos has always been distinguished by self-orientation, pragmatism, and disdain for top-down approaches to society. This is not surprising considering that the country was founded by rights and liberties religious conservatives & advanced by opportunity-seeking economic immigrants. In the course of US history, overtly conservative legislation eventually started to have a negative economic impact, and opportunities from sustaining the status quo.

To increase their chances of winning reelection, conservative officials have been forced to reluctantly soften their stances. One example of this well-known phenomenon is the decriminalization of marijuana by conservative legislatures in Louisiana (2021), the repeal of stockpile tax reductions in Kansas (2018), the abolition of capital punishment in North Dakota (1973), and the repeal of the pro-law in Montana (1953). In states that support abortion, the Dobbs decision will make abortion a thriving economic force.

When compared to alarming news alternatives in other jurisdictions, improved living conditions, job growth, and tax revenues in other places will ultimately persuade legislators in unintended pregnancy states to their ideological opposition. If progressive movements are to start believing their assertions, Dobbs will still have resulted in an America in which abortion will be practiced more generously in the ensuing decades, with fewer rules in states that support abortion and limitations similar to those that prevailed before Dobbs in other states.

The fervor around and religious groups with sway over state politics) will delay some of this advancement, but not enough to turn it back. The practicality and economic needs that have historically served as the other “supreme court” in America will have to take precedence over conservative beliefs.