Roe v. Wade: From Landmark Decision to Legal Collapse

Everyone has heard of Roe v. Wade. More accurately, everyone has heard of it being overturned. But while the impact of this shattering Supreme Court decision remains obvious across America even two years later, many people still do not fully understand the background of the Roe v. Wade decision. Everyone knows that the case guaranteed the right to abortion, but it’s how this right was Constitutionally justified that made it so significant— and makes its demise so terrifying.

In 1970, a young woman needed an abortion in Dallas County, Texas. However, Texas had outlawed abortions except by a doctor’s orders to save a woman’s life. She decided to sue the district attorney of Dallas County to challenge this law, but used a fictional name in court documents to protect herself from backlash. In her lawsuit, Jane Roe claimed that Texas’s laws were unconstitutionally vague and violated her right of personal privacy, protected by the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments. 

In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court recognized that the right to decide whether to continue a pregnancy is protected by the liberty clause in the 14th Amendment. For the first time, Roe categorized reproductive decision-making as a fundamental right, such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion. By recognizing the right to privacy in pregnancy-related decisions, the Supreme Court established a precedent for a right to privacy that protects intimate and personal decisions from governmental interference. That foundation has now collapsed with the overturning of Roe v. Wade. 

After nearly 50 years, the constitutional right to abortion was reversed on June 24, 2022 in the Dobbs v. Jackson decision. The case was centered around a Mississippi law called the “Gestational Age Act,” which prohibited all abortions after 15 weeks’ gestational age, with only a few exceptions. Jackson Women’s Health Organization is the only licensed abortion facility in Mississippi, and one of its doctors filed a lawsuit challenging the law. The district court stopped Mississippi from enforcing the law because of the precedent set in Roe. Mississippi appealed, and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals once again struck down the law. Mississippi appealed to the Supreme Court, and in a devastating opinion, they revoked the constitutional right to abortion. This case was the first time the Court had considered a pre-viability abortion ban since Roe, and the 6-3 ruling would not have occurred if it weren’t for President Trump’s three appointed justices who made up half of the majority. 

“The Court’s opinion delivers a wrecking ball to the constitutional right to abortion, destroying the protections of Roe v. Wade, and utterly disregarding the one in four women in America who make the decision to end a pregnancy,” said Nancy Northup, President and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights in a statement. “While public support for access to abortion is at an all-time high, the Court has hit a new low by taking away – for the first time ever – a constitutionally guaranteed personal liberty.” 

The catastrophic effects do not end there. Justice Thomas was quoted saying that the legal rationale behind this decision could be applied to overturn other major cases, including those that legalized gay marriage, barred the criminalization of consensual homosexual conduct, and protected the rights of married people to have access to contraception. There is no longer a Constitutional right to privacy. The Supreme Court decisions to come in the near future could wreck the liberties we have long been granted.