I haven’t seen a thread yet? Supreme Court to overturn legal right to abortion in the US.

[AlternativePerspective]

Roe v Wade: US Supreme Court may overturn abortion law, leak suggests www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-61302740

And if this is successful, how long before similar decisions are made over here and elsewhere where women still have the right to bodily autonomy.

Absolutely. It’s just derailing to push an agenda.

Out of interest I just looked it up, and it seems that out of nine Supreme Court justices, six are catholic

I wonder how much this will influence the decision?

I think most Europeans cannot grasp how very different the US actually is. Most know about the right to bear arms and the shambles that is US healthcare. But the differences go much deeper and many of them are rooted in a deep seated belief in individual responsibility and a conviction that anyone can make it if they work hard enough and that supporting the weak and unfortunate only encourages more people to rely on the public purse.

Despite the ACA (aka 'Obamacare'), many cannot afford adequate healthcare. Others pay expensive premiums for plans that come with huge deductibles.

In most states there is no mandated right to vacation or maternity leave, let alone paternity leave. Even where these exist, it's very limited. Many mothers are back at work when their baby is 3 months old.

There is the official division between church and state, but in many places you are ostracised if you don't go to church. There is a strong movement for home schooling (rooted in religious conviction) and for banning certain 'liberal' books from libraries in many counties.

It is the conservative, Christian states that drive the move to restrict abortion, but it has always been difficult for many women to access affordable contraception and abortion. Until the ACA, some health plans did not fund contraception.

There is no official segregation but, in practice, African Americans tend to live in segregated neighbourhoods and their children go to inadequately funded schools (due to school funding being tied to property taxes and blacks tending to live in poor neighbourhoods).

Overall it is a very unequal, sink or swim society. If Roe v Wade is repealed, it'll be the poorest and most disadvantaged women who'll pay the price. No doubt women will do what they've always done - muddle through as best they can - but I fear that another generation of unwanted children will pay the price of Christian 'pro life' righteousness.

One big frustration is that the right to abortion at the federal level always hinged on a specific interpretation of the 14th amendment to the US constitution. It was never an actual law passed by congress. That is where this is all hinging.

The frustration comes in in that congress has had 50 years to act and pass a law, some of that time, they could have passed it unilaterally over the opposition. Unfortunately, they didn't.

This was my vauge understanding having listen to programs and commentators that touched on this over the years.

However on another thread a poster was saying there was nothing to be done as any federal law would be stuck down as unconstitutional under the Tenth Amendment - and I don't know enough about US law/constitution to know what's correct.

I don't think we are under the same threats in UK yet - we don't have the same voting blocks our right wing parties are usually considered to be left of US democates and it's a very different society - here recent changes have been about getting NI on same page with abortions as rest of UK.

I also think FlowerArranger is correct there are huge social and poltical differences between UK and US and I think that's frequently not fully understood or glossed over especially on-line.

Yeah, a federal level law governing abortion access could be struck down based upon the 10th amendment, which basically states that any powers not explicitly granted to the Federal government are reserved to the states.

I think that is the primary difference that tends to cause confusion for many non-Americans, and in fairness, many Americans as well. The United States is a republic of states where each state operates with significant autonomy. Federally, it is more akin to the EU, where in the EU, there are certain things that EU member countries must agree to and uphold in order to be a member of the EU, but each member country still has significant internal autonomy to govern themselves.

To amplify my point that it is hard to see something like this happening here, key differences between Britain and the US are that we as a society are much more progressive, and significantly more secular. And the Human Rights Act 1998 would also clearly be able to be used if the government here were to try to say repeal the Abortion Act 1967. Even if the government repealed HRA, we would retain our rights under the underlying Convention unless we withdrew from that, something even Hungary and Poland haven’t expressed much appetite for, as far as I know. And it would be a very, very odd move.

Just what the world needs!!! 🌎

Devils advocate but... the USA is a democracy. Women make up half of all voters. We voted for Boris, they voted for Trump.

Let’s hope all those good Christians are fully prepared to fund the homes for all the unwanted children. I’m assuming also that all those children suffering from congenital difficulties are supported with lots of free medical treatment. Plus, of course, lots of therapists for the women who conceive through rape. Or perhaps that will be their own fault and therefore they deserve to be raped.

What a harrowing place the US seems to be for women.

Also: fuck Democrat politicians who refer to women seeking an abortion as 'birthing bodies'.

I mean, Jesus Christ, could you get any more offensive?

This whole thing is so depressing. On the one hand you have people who want to completrly remove the reproductive rights of women and wield completely power over their bodies, and on the other side you have people who appear to be quite happy to just compeltely dehumanise us, erase us as a sex class and lose the rights we have based on being part of that sex class.

Literally no one gives a shit about women!

To be pedantic, the USA is a Constitutional Representative Republic, not a democracy. The individual states are democracies where each state has a level of autonomy in their own governance, and each state provides representation to the federal congress for the purpose of representing their state.

This is awful. I've nothing useful to add I'm just horrified. It's like watching Gilead develop in front of our eyes. Feel helpless.

Yeah, a federal level law governing abortion access could be struck down based upon the 10th amendment, which basically states that any powers not explicitly granted to the Federal government are reserved to the states.

Unless the Federal law is a constitutional amendment which takes 2/3rds Congress to pass and 3/4th the states to ratify as the 10th amendment states any powers not explicitly granted to the Federal government by the Constitution are reserved to the States.

For example, Congress amended the Constitution to allow for federal income tax to be levied in 1909 with the 16th Amendment (ratified in 1913) in response to a Supreme Court ruling in 1895 which over-ruled it.

And this distinction is particularly significant when you consider that the majority voted for Hillary, not Trump.

And that’s before we get into the heinous voting suppression tactics seen in Republican-controlled states.

It’s utterly depressing. It most definitely feels like we are going backwards in this world at the moment rather than progressing.

And this gets right to one of the core ideals set out in the founding of the United States. Measures put in place to prevent states with large populations from running roughshod over states with smaller populations. Remove the vote surplus Hillary won in the single state of California, and Trump has more votes.

I honestly see no end to this.

I’ve just seen this on Twitter. Heartbreaking tweets. twitter.com/Joyjoysilva/status/1521323834661433344 (warning, mentions suicide)