Emergency: The Assault on Stare Decisis
You already know about the Supreme Court decision striking down Roe and it’s important to put that decision into context.
Be clear that this decision will result in Daisy, raped at age 13 by her father, having to take that incest-caused pregnancy to term. It means that Maryanne, raped in a laundromat by an unknown thug, will have to carry that baby, too. And 53 year old, diabetic Lucy will have to carry her surprise pregnancy all the way to the point that it kills her. None of these women or any other woman is in charge of her own body any longer. The Supreme Court has established government mandated pregnancy, putting politicians in control women’s bodies.
Clearly, women no longer have autonomy or full citizenship.
At least since John Roberts was being vetted by the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2003, he and all subsequent candidates have been questioned about their views regarding Supreme Court precedent. Every candidate has declared their belief in stare decisis – “to stand by things decided” – which directs that settled law should not be re-litigated. And every candidate has given clear enough indication that they believed that Roe is settled law. But it turns out that their claims of fidelity to settled Supreme Court decisions just weren’t true.
The Republican Senate has consistently allowed that dishonesty.
Roe was decided in 1973 by a 7-2 vote and was unsuccessfully challenged many times (see this ACLU Timeline). The Court repeatedly upheld Roe. That’s a lot of settled law, but that was of no consequence to the liars on the court. Roe is gone.
Also this week, the Supreme Court overturned a 100 year old law that prohibits carrying guns in public in the State of New York. It’s yet another example of extremist Justices ignoring precedent – violating stare decisis, which they claimed they believed in – and moving us backward to a far more dangerous time.
Keep monitoring your shock response, as more decisions come down criminalizing all aspects of abortion. That includes criminal penalties for an Uber driver who brings a woman to a clinic; against friends who lend her money for an abortion; and against supportive husbands and boyfriends. Expect criminal penalties heaped upon women from states banning abortion who travel to a state that allows abortion. Bear in mind that Texas has already empowered vigilantes to spy on neighbors and report them to the Texas Gestapo for bounties, for levying fines and for criminal prosecution.
Expect challenges to Griswold, which will result in the outlawing of birth control. And don’t be the least bit surprised as this extremist Supreme Court attacks same-sex marriage by overturning Obergefell; or bans inter-racial marriage by overturning Loving; bans private consensual sexual activities; encourages more gun violence; and incrementally inserts religion into yet more governmental arenas. Bear in mind that over 80% of Americans did not want Roe reversed. This Court is all about minority-enabled bullying of the rest of us and Justice Clarence Thomas has invited cases to the Court already.
The true context of this overturning of Roe is the elimination of stare decisis, which opens the floodgates to a Supreme Court attack on our freedoms, protections and traditions. Credit for that goes to the decades-long efforts of Republicans to return us to the very worst of American Puritanical tyranny, accompanied by the continuous drone of self-righteous Bible thumping.
The Chicago Protest
Rage was in the air. The fury caused by theft and betrayal dominated the Federal Plaza in Chicago on Friday, June 24. It was a day and an event that will be remembered for a very long time, with a permanent distrust of the Supreme Court its lasting legacy. That’s what happened as a result of the Court stabbing all women in the back.
Here are pics of some of the signs from that demonstration. The more foul messages have been excluded, but don’t imagine even for a moment that anger and aggression didn’t dominate the event.
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Our governance and electoral corruption and dysfunction and our ongoing mass murders are all of a piece, all the same problem with the same solution:
Fire the bastards!
The days are dwindling for us to take action. Get up! Do something to make things better.
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Copyright 2022 by Jack Altschuler
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