'Shocking and appalling': Bay Area leaders gearing up to protect access to legal abortions in California

If you have not read the leaked draft opinion, this is a very good and readable annotated version ( Web Link ). One may not agree, but it is an extremely well written, well thought out, well documented argument for the decision. It is definitely not a hack politician piece. And, it identifies and discusses more than just the decision to overturn (including the effect on the country and the effect on the Court). It certainly gave me things to think about. Not the least of which is, what might the political and medical abortion landscape look like today had Roe not been decided as it was and had evolving popular opinion worked to persuade legislatures to enact meaningful and appropriate legislation. Again, I recommend the article.

This leak is deliberate and political.

I will defend to the death another woman's right to choose not to have an abortion if she doesn't want one, but no one should be imposing their personal values (and faith) on another person--Least of all, a group of men who will never personally face that choice with its medical, emotional, ethical complexities.

Your values and your faith should guide YOUR life. More than half of Americans think women should have the legal right to choose. This Christian woman is one of them. The court has no business deciding these most private decisions, especially where there is no public majority consensus. The law, as it stands, allows each woman (and her partner with her doctor) to make a personal decision based on personal values and circumstances. That is as it should be.

If you think abortion is wrong, you are free not to have one. I support your right to choose--for yourself.

@Consider Your Options - " The court has no business deciding these most private decisions"

Good news for ya! The supreme court agrees with you, and their decision is that it is none of their business, and they will no longer be involved in decision making around abortion.

It was Roe that was meddling, defining when a woman could, and when a woman couldn't get an abortion. We are all now free from a cabal of 9 making abortion rules.

@john_alderman, your logic is utterly backwards, not to mention backward. "It was Roe that was meddling, defining when a woman could, and when a woman couldn't get an abortion."

Excuse me?!?!??? No, Roe defined that a woman in any state in this country could avail herself of abortion care, no matter where she lived and not die from botched abortions at the hands of illegal butchers.

I assume you are male because of your name. Men impregnating women may "experience" fatherhood for all of the five minutes or less that ejaculation requires and walk away forever without a care in the world.

The lives of impregnated women change forever, period. THAT IS WHY MEN HAVE NO BUSINESS MAKING RULES ABOUT WOMEN'S BODIES.

Until men suffer each and every consequence of impregnating women on precisely the same level as the women they impregnate, women denied safe, medically competent, and legal abortions will continue to die or be forced to bear children as a result of rape or incest or medical misfortune.

Please review your junior high school biology notes. And please read the actual court decisions before you blithely and incoherently assert their contents.

@vmshadle, thank you. It's also worth remembering that one religion doesn't have the right to force its beliefs on others who believe in other religions or none at all. In Judaism, live starts at birth, not at some arbitrary point in time.

Remember Separation of Church and State? Remember Freedom of Religion and Freedom FROM Religion??

And for those dismissing rape as a reason for an abortion, let's remember the huge number of girls and women who are raped every single day. Why ruin the life of a girl or woman by forcing her to raise the spawn of a criminal and be reminded of that violence every day of her life?

Rapists can sue HER for terminating the pregnancy but she can't sue the rapist for child support.

Online Name, thank you too. I'm none too sure that the average American understands that halacha (Jewish law) does not define personhood as commencing at conception, and that we Jews are commanded to save the life of the mother when circumstances dictate. Orthodox Jewish women are already in turmoil over being forced to violate halacha if Roe v. Wade falls. Other faith traditions likely have their own rules.

Women are not mere vessels, creating life at the whim of men. Legally, we stopped being male property some time ago. Or so I thought. The (white male) Republican governor of Mississippi now refuses to rule out banning contraception should Roe v. Wade fall. Griswold v. Connecticut may be targeted next.

I can't even.

@vmshadle - I suggest you reread Roe, because it is clear you don't understand it. 9 unelected men created an arbitrary abortion regulatory regime, based on trimesters where states could not restrict at all in the first trimester, could enact partial restrictions in the second trimester, and could prohibit completely in the third trimester. That is definitionally meddling.

Repealing Roe removes all court imposed federal meddling. The court, and constitution are back to the normal, neutral state. States can do what they want without the dictates of a cabal of 9.

You have no business condescending to me like that, Mr. Alderman. What you term "meddling" is what I call an attempt to craft judicial precedent that would be as widely acceptable as possible. Picking nits about "meddling" is a meaningless argument and is furthermore ENTIRELY irrelevant to the lives of women and their right to control their own bodies.

@vmshadle. Call it whatever you want, meddling, judicial activism, "crafting precedent" from an imaginary constitution. It all amounts to interference by the Supreme Court over something they should have stayed out of.

FWIW, you do have 100% control of your own body. But, a baby is a separate body with its own rights. Even Roe acknowledged that (in a limp wristed sort of way).

Allow me to repeat myself, Mr. Alderman:

"I assume you are male because of your name. Men impregnating women may "experience" fatherhood for all of the five minutes or less that ejaculation requires and walk away forever without a care in the world.

The lives of impregnated women change forever, period. THAT IS WHY MEN HAVE NO BUSINESS MAKING RULES ABOUT WOMEN'S BODIES.

Until men suffer each and every consequence of impregnating women on precisely the same level as the women they impregnate, women denied safe, medically competent, and legal abortions will continue to die or be forced to bear children as a result of rape or incest or medical misfortune."

When men bear the consequences on an EQUAL basis with the women THEY IMPREGNATE, then we'll discuss the (VERY Christian) notion of embryo and fetal rights.

I hereby terminate this highly non-productive dialogue with you, a man who may opt to impregnate as many women as he wishes and never bear a single consequence (including being forced to take responsibility for the children he produces) whilst changing or ruining the lives of as many women and children as he wishes. Goodbye.