Fourteenth Amendment Case Study

Roe v. Wade (1971) 

In Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), the Supreme Court determined a law banning the distribution and possession of contraceptives for married couples was unconstitutional. It determined that while not explicit, the Constitution protected an implied right to privacy through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

In 1970, Texas law banned abortions except to save the mother’s life. A woman there became pregnant, wanted to have an abortion, and filed a lawsuit under the name of Jane Roe. She argued that the law violated her right to privacy.

In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Roe. Justice Harry Blackmun wrote the majority opinion, in which he used medical research to split a pregnancy up into trimesters. The majority determined that state governments could not restrict abortions during the first trimester. Blackmun wrote, “This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment’s concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action [or]…in the Ninth Amendment’s reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. The detriment that the State would impose upon the pregnant woman by denying this choice altogether is apparent.”

Justice William Rehnquist wrote a dissent criticizing the Court for what in his view constituted making up a new constitutional right. He also argued the Court was incorrectly exercising a power best left to representatives in legislatures. Rehnquist wrote, “The decision here to break pregnancy into three distinct terms and to outline the permissible restrictions the State may impose…partakes more of judicial legislation than it does of a determination of the intent of the drafters of the Fourteenth Amendment.”

The Roe decision would be overturned by the Supreme Court in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022), which determined  the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion. Instead, the Court argued, the people through their elected representatives have the authority to determine what laws should exist concerning abortion regulation.