Politico obtained what it says is a draft decision that the Supreme Court is striking down Roe v Wade, the case that legalized abortion in 1973. If the document is authentic, Justice Samuel Alito has written the initial draft majority opinion, Politico reports, concluding: “We do not pretend to know how our political system or society will respond to today’s decision overruling Roe and Casey. And even if we could foresee what will happen, we would have no authority to let that knowledge influence our decision. We can only do our job, which is to interpret the law, apply longstanding principles of stare decisis, and decide the case accordingly. We therefore hold that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion.”
Alito writes: “Roe and Casey must be overruled, and the authority to regulate abortion must be returned to the people and their elected representatives.” Alito noted that for the first 185 years after the adoption of the Constitution, each state was permitted to address the abortion issue according to the will of its citizens. In 1973 all that changed. He writes: “Even though the Constitution makes no mention of abortion, the Court held that it confers a broad right to obtain one. It did not claim that American law or the common law had ever recognized such a right…” Alito agreed with Justice Byron White’s 1973 dissent of the opinion, saying it represented the “exercise of raw judicial power.”
In 98 pages, Alito gives sound reasoning and a compelling history of how the states handled the question of abortion prior to 1973 and how they are dealing with it today. If this decision is the final, it rightly interprets the Constitution’s 10th Amendment, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” What the decision would do is grant the states the authority to decide whether abortion should be legal in that state. The entire debate shifts to the states and away from the US Constitution. This means that the overturn of Roe does not end abortion, it kicks the debate to another level.
Politico says it obtained the draft decision from a source familiar with the Mississippi abortion case brought before SCOTUS. This has sparked debate over why it was released and whether the pro-abortion Democrats will use it as justification to pack the Court with liberals to overturn this particular decision. I am reminded of Christ’s words in John 10:10, “I have come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” America’s Declaration of Independence reaffirms Christ’s words, saying that all men (all mankind) are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, “that among these are Life, Liberty and pursuit of Happiness.” This decision will not end the debate on the right to life of the most vulnerable and innocent. It will fuel it in all 50 states. Believers (the Church) must be prepared to do a better job instilling God’s law into the hearts of people.
