For over a half-century, it was a woman’s constitutional right to safe abortion. Now, that is no longer the case after the United States Supreme Court made a shocking decision to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling.
As a result of this monumental decision, while it does not make abortion illegal, the decision to allow women this right will now be decided at the state level. According to NBC News, just about half the states have admitted they would ban the procedure should the Supreme Court overturn Roe v. Wade.
BREAKING NEWS: Supreme Court Decides to Overturn Roe v. Wade
As CNN clarifies, at least 21 states have laws or constitutional amendments already in place that suggest they would attempt to ban abortion “as quickly as possible,” the Guttmacher Institute, which favors abortion rights, reports.
In the ruling, Justice Samuel Alito wrote that the court’s decision in Roe “sparked a national controversy that has embittered our political culture for a half-century.”
“We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision,” he wrote. “It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives.”
The majority opinion was also backed by Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, all of whom were appointed by Republican presidents.
In a response signed by liberal Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor, they wrote that the court “reverses course today for one reason and one reason only: because the composition of this Court has changed.”
“Today, the proclivities of individuals rule,” they added. “The Court departs from its obligation to faithfully and impartially apply the law. With sorrow — for this Court, but more, for the many millions of American women who have today lost a fundamental constitutional protection — we dissent.”
As CNN reports, the final opinion published by the Supreme Court bared a “striking” resemblance to the draft that was leaked in May. However, Alito’s response to the dissent is new.
It reads, “The dissent is very candid that it cannot show that a constitutional right to abortion has any foundation, let alone a ‘deeply rooted’ one, ‘in this Nation’s history and tradition.’”
“The dissent does not identify any pre-Roe authority that supports such a right — no state constitutional provision or statute, no federal or state judicial precedent, not even a scholarly treatise.”
Majority of Americans, according to a poll conducted by CNN, reveal that 66% of Americans did not want the Supreme Court to completely overturn the decision.