I should probably know the answer to this, but I don’t —
Once upon a time, I believe, individual states had various laws on abortion. Then Roe v Wade came along and claimed to establish a constitutional right to abortion that operated at the federal level.
And so (I think) state level laws on abortion largely disappeared —not entirely, but mostly. Now we see states stepping up and basically banning abortion — which I think is a direct challenge to Roe v Wade.
I assume this is all an effort to get this in front of the Supreme Court again so that Roe can be over turned. Barring such a new SCOTUS ruling, these new state laws are directly in conflict with “settled law”, right? In effect, under Roe, these states “can’t do” what they are doing. Is that right?
(And just in case there is any confusion: I’m thrilled that these states are doing what they are doing.)
Roe vs. Wade was formulated and operted on the premise that neither the federal government or the states had ever formally recognized a fetus as a living human being. The entire decision rested on that idea, and that has always was the achilles heel of the concept of a right to an abortion in the United States because the life that was being taken was not a life according the either the federal or state governments. Right leaning politicians have simply been too cowardly to formally recognize the unborn.
FYI, I learned this straight from the mouth of Sarah Weddington, who was “Roe’s” (Norma McCorvey’s) lawyer in Roe v. Wade, I met her while protesting a speech she gave at my university. Side note: Until Barack Obama rolls around she was the #1 user of the words “I” and “me” that I had ever seen... it was abundantly obvious that she didn’t care at all about her client, and that it was all about her.