Lekha G
The US Supreme Court on Monday agreed to consider decimating the 1973, Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion nationwide in consideration of the Mississippi’s bid to rejuvenate a Republican-backed state law that bans the procedure after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
The Supreme Court has taken up a case on whether states should prohibit abortions before a fetus can live outside the womb, with three justices appointed by President Donald Trump being part of a 6-3 conservative majority.
In Roe v. Wade decision, reaffirmed in 1992, the Court ruled that States could not ban abortion before the viability of the fetus outside the womb, which is generally viewed by doctors in between 24 and 28 weeks. The Mississippi law would ban abortion much earlier than that.
Mississippi’s ban had been blocked by lower courts as inconsistent with Supreme Court precedent that protects a women’s right to obtain before the fetus can survive outside her womb.
Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights said, “Alarm bells are ringing loudly about the threat to reproductive rights. The Supreme Court just agreed to review an abortion ban that unquestionably violates nearly 50 years of Supreme Court precedent and is a test case to overturn Roe v. wade”.
The White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki informed the reports that Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration was committed to defending abortion rights. He further said abortion and access to healthcare have come under “Withering and extreme attack” in recent years including through “Draconian state laws”.
Further, the Supreme Court in a 5-4 majority ruling in June 2020 struck down a Louisiana law that imposed restrictions on doctors who performed abortions.
Circuit Judge Patrick Higginbotham said, “States may regulate abortion procedures prior to viability so long as they do not impose an undue burden on the women’s right, but they may not ban abortions. The law at issue is a ban”.
The Mississippi appeal had been pending at the court since June, 2020. During that time, Ginsburg had died and was replaced by Barrett and Trump lost his re-election bid to be replaced by Biden, who supported abortion rights.
The case is probably to be argued in the fall, with a decision likely in the spring of 2022, during the campaign for congressional mid-term elections.