The Supreme Court Has Voted To Strike Down Roe V. Wade, According To An Initial Draft Majority Opinion
The 1973 case called Roe v. Wade is one of the most well-known cases to have ever arrived at the Supreme Court. The landmark decision granted federal constitutional protections of women to abort their unborn babies.
POLITICO obtained an initial draft majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito, which says that the Supreme Court has voted to overturn Roe v. Wade. This doesn't necessarily mean the decision is final, though, as justices can choose to change their vote as draft opinions are written. We won't hear a decision until the final opinion is published.
The Supreme Court Has Reportedly Voted To Strike Down Roe v. Wade
“Roe was egregiously wrong from the start,” Justice Alito writes in the 98-page draft. "Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences. And far from bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue, Roe and Casey have enflamed debate and deepened division."
“We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled,” Alito writes. Casey refers to Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the 1992 decision that upheld Roe v. Wade and reaffirmed that the federal government is prohibited from banning abortion.
“It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives," Alito continues. The draft notes that "the right to abortion" doesn't fall within the rights to liberty that are laid out in the Constitution.
One source familiar with the matter said that Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett (all the Republican-appointed justices) have voted with Alito in this case after they listened to oral arguments in December.
Should this draft decision turn out to be the Court's final decision, that would mean the abortion privileges granted at the federal level would be taken away.
It's unprecedented to see a draft decision leaked to the public like this, as the Supreme Court is generally very secretive of its drafts so this will surely have an enormous impact on the comings and goings of Washington, DC. And it will certainly be the trending topic online everywhere for the days to come.