Weekly Opinion Editorial
TIME
TO RIGHT A WRONG!
by
Steve Fair
The case is Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s
Health Organization(JWHO). It challenges
a 2018 Mississippi law that bans most abortions after 15 weeks. The law is in conflict with Roe v. Wade, the
landmark 1973 ruling that declared a woman has a constitutional right to
terminate a pregnancy in the first six months of a pregnancy. Oklahoma, Mississippi and ten other states
have abortion trigger laws that would take effect immediately if Roe v. Wade is
overturned. “A decision upholding
this ban is tantamount to overruling Roe,” said Julie Rikelman, the lawyer
for JWHO. “There are no half measures
here.” Sherif Girgis, a Notre Dame law professor and former clerk for
Justice Alito says. According to the liberal Guttmacher Institute
a ruling affirming the Mississippi law would ban or severely restrict abortion
in 26 U.S. states. Three observations:
First, the U.S. Constitution does not guarantee
the right to an abortion. Justice
Clarence Thomas has written the founding document is silent on the subject of
abortion and said the SCOTUS bends its own rules and procedures to protect Roe
v. Wade and the 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey rulings. Few rulings by the SCOTUS have cried out as
loudly for reversal, or both moral and legal grounds, as Roe v. Wade. The majority opinion in Roe is fraught with
conspicuous errors of law, fact and reasoning.
Justice Thomas said in 2019: “In my view, if the SCOTUS encounters a
decision that is demonstrably erroneous- i.e., one that is not a permissible
interpretation of the text-the SCOTUS should correct the error, regardless of
whether other factors support overruling the precedent.”
Even supporters of Roe admit the problem
with the ruling is it has little connection to the Constitutional right(privacy)
it purportedly interpreted. Most legal
experts say it is a stretch to include abortion as a constitutionally protected
right based on privacy and it has no foundation in constitutional text, history
or precedent.
Second, the Constitution does guarantee
the right to life. It’s in the preamble. If the SCOTUS should rule unborn children are persons
under the Constitution’s 14th Amendment, then Roe is toast. The Constitution explicitly guarantees the
right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. A positive ruling would extend those rights
to the unborn.
Third, an estimated 62 million children in
the U.S. have been aborted since 1973. The
economic impact of abortion during that period is in the billions- both in lost
workers and productivity, and in taxes not paid to government. Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards argues
that there is no specific moment when life begins and says her children’s life
began when they were born. Dr. Jerome
Lejeune, the father of modern genetics, disagrees. He says, “To accept the fact that after fertilization
has taken place, a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste
or opinion—it is plain experimental evidence.
Each individual has a very neat beginning, at conception.”
The SCOTUS has the opportunity this week to
right a 48-year-old wrong. Christians should be in prayer they will rule to
uphold the Mississippi law. It could
save millions of unborn children’s lives.
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