The past week saw abortion law reviewed by the US Supreme Court, but no overall review of Roe v Wade was triggered. Many scholars believe that this is because the laws that were reviewed were not sufficient to overturn Roe v Wade. The most incendiary outcome of the review was Clarence Thomas’s concurring opinion in which he openly questioned the motives of the abortion movement and its historical roots in eugenics. Even the New York Times admits “In any other area, the left would look at a history like this and ask whether those formal convictions are the only thing that matters, or whether the eugenic past still exerts a structural influence on the present. And in any other area of policy Thomas’s point about how legal abortion appears, in the aggregate, to act in racist and eugenic ways would be taken as an indicator that something more than just emancipation is at work.” Read about Thomas’s opinion here and here. The New York Times opinion piece can be found here.
Entertainment production companies are lining up to pressure Georgia for recently moving forward with anti-abortion legislation in another attempt to trigger a review of Roe v Wade at the Supreme Court. CBS, NBC, Netflix, and Disney have all announced some level of intent to reduce operations in Georgia as a response. Read more here.
Pro Life Democrat Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards signed into law a heartbeat bill that bans abortions after a heartbeat can be detected. This represents a major break from his party, and a rare pro life victory legislated through a state with a sitting Democrat governor. Read more here.
Finally, Illinois has passed a bill that would repeal the Illinois Abortion Law of 1975 and its provisions that called for spousal consent, waiting periods, criminal penalties for physicians who perform abortions and other restrictions on facilities where abortions are performed. The bill would establish “the fundamental right” of a pregnant woman to have an abortion and states that “a fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus does not have independent rights.” Of course, in its quest to improve ‘women’s access to health care’, the bill also removes many medical requirements on those who would perform abortions. Read more here and here.