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Judicial branch on abortion (Roe v. Wade)
The case that made abortion legal
The case that made abortion legal
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Recommended: Judicial branch on abortion (Roe v. Wade)
Does a fetus have rights? Many people think so, they think that abortion is violating the embryos’ rights. Do an embryo's rights trump the rights of the mother? They don't. Having a baby can be hard on the mother economically, mentally, and physically. When the Romanian government banned abortions women were still got them and deaths due to illegal abortions skyrocketed. Teenage girls who get pregnant are shunned and shamed by parents, friends and their communities and births in hospitals are very expensive. The Supreme Court has even said that banning abortions would be unconstitutional due to the 14th amendment. Many of the Republican candidates for president believe that abortion should be illegal. Abortion should be a woman's choice. During the case of Roe v. Wade when the Supreme Court was decided whether a woman's rights included the right to choose to abort a pregnancy. The verdict was the "Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action" includes "a right of personal privacy, or a guarantee of certain areas or zones of …show more content…
When you ban abortions, women are still frantic to get rid of their pregnancy. In Romania, they had sketchy procedures performed on them, just to rid themselves of their baby . A woman named Cherisse in Illinois was told that “If you have an abortion now, you’ll rupture your uterus and won’t be able to have children in the future.” She was scared and didn’t know what to do so she went ahead and had her son. Soon after his birth she lost her job and couldn’t afford to pay her COBRA, utilities, rent and food. Since then, she has had three abortions. If Cherisse had the important information that she needed to make an informed decision about having an abortion she could have kept her job and been able to pay for food. Would it have been better to save Cherisse from poverty and homelessness or to restrict her from an
Abortion has been one of the biggest controversies of all time. According to the Oxford dictionary, the term abortion can be defined as, the deliberate termination of human pregnancy, most often performed during the first 28 weeks of pregnancy. There are two different types of abortion; a spontaneous abortion, which is also known as a miscarriage, and an induced abortion, where the embryo or fetus is purposely removed from the women’s body. The topic of induced abortion has been widely debated for hundreds of years. The issue of abortion was argued way back in the time of the ancient Hebrews. Today many people consider abortion to be murder, but shouldn’t the soon-to-be mother 's right to make such a personal and heartbreaking choice be
Roe v. Wade is court case of 1973 in which the Supreme Court ruled that a woman has a constitutional right to an abortion during the first six months of pregnancy. Before the Court's ruling, a majority of states prohibited abortion but most allowed an exception when pregnancy threatened the woman's life. The Court overturned these state bans in Roe v. Wade. The Court ruled that states could restrict abortions only during the final three months of pregnancy. The decision was strongly endorsed by many women's rights groups. However, it was fiercely opposed by many others of whom said that life begins at conception.
Despite all the social, medical and religious undertones in the abortion debate, the Roe v. Wade opinion, written by Justice Harry Blackmun, has stood for twenty-four years on the basis that the right to choose an abortion is part of a woman's "right to personal privacy," a right that Blackmun stated is "founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action."
The case that I decided to write about is one of the most controversial cases that have ever happened in the United States. The Roe v. Wade (1973) case decided that a woman with her doctor could choose to have an abortion during the early months of that pregnancy. However, if the woman chose to wait until the later months of the pregnancy then they would have certain restrictions based on their right to privacy. This case invalidated all state laws which limited women’s access to abortions during their first trimester of their pregnancy which was based on the Ninth Amendment of the Constitution. The Amendment states that “the enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people” (Cornell University Law School, 2013).
The rights to an abortion has been diminishing greatly and it is continuing to weaken long after the Supreme Court ruling. In 1973 in the United States a Supreme Court cased known as Roe vs Wade addressed a women’s right to privacy. A woman who for protection purposes went by the name of Jane Roe wanted to have the decision to terminate her pregnancy without it being a matter of whether she was doing it for the purpose of saving her own life. This Supreme Court case although it was too late to help Jane Roe since she had already given birth allowed the women the constitutional right to privacy when it comes to an abortion.
The Roe vs. Wade decision held that a woman, with her doctor, could choose abortion in earlier months of pregnancy without restriction, and with restrictions in later months, based on the right to privacy. It invalidated all state laws limiting women's access to abortions during the first trimester of pregnancy based on the Ninth Amendment to the United States Constitution, a part of the Bill of Rights. The Court's decision in this case was that the Ninth Amendment, "the enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people," protected a person's right to privacy.
Every woman has the right to make any decision that involves her body. Our government has always respected the individual’s right to privacy. A woman’s reproductive system should not be regulated by the government. In the Supreme Court case, Roe v. Wade in 1973, the decision to make abortion legal came in effect (Frohock 1983). Before Roe, many women were pregnant were forced to weigh their respect for the law against their positivism that they were not ready to be mothers. Many women chose to break the law, putting their lives and futures at risk, and decided to get unsafe and expensive procedures.
Since the early 1970’s abortion has been an important issue to the United States (Tietze 1). The problem begins with whether it is the woman’s choice to keep or terminate her pregnancy or the government’s choice. When this problem happens, a woman loses her right as a person. Most women argue about this issue, but if you look at it, it is the woman’s body, and she should do with it as she pleases. I believe that if a woman, under the right circumstances, should be able to make her own choices in life and not be influenced by family or the government.
Abortion has been a controversial topic in the U.S ever since it became legal in 1973 after the Roe v. Wade case. Abortion is defined as the, “the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy, most often performed during the first 28 weeks of pregnancy.” Pro-life supporters believe that abortion is unethical and argue that it is the mother’s responsibility to own up to her actions. They also argue that there is always the option of adoption, and that abortion could be very dangerous. I am pro-life and believe that the government doesn’t have the right to decide what a woman can or can’t do with her body.
It is almost unanimously agreed upon that the right to life is the most important and sacred right possessed by human beings. With this being said, it comes as no surprise that there are few issues that are more contentious than abortion. Some consider the process of abortion as immoral and consisting of the deprivation of one’s right to life. Others, on the opposite end of the spectrum, see abortion as a liberty and a simple exercise of the right to the freedom of choice.
Abortion has been a complex social issue in the United States ever since restrictive abortion laws began to appear in the 1820s. By 1965, abortions had been outlawed in the U.S., although they continued illegally; about one million abortions per year were estimated to have occurred in the 1960s. (Krannich 366) Ultimately, in the 1973 Supreme Court case of Roe v. Wade, it was ruled that women had the right to privacy and could make an individual choice on whether or not to have an abortion during the first trimester of pregnancy. (Yishai 213)
Abortion has been a topic of debate for the past two hundred years. During the years shortly after our country’s independence, abortion laws were little to none other than the common law adopted from England; which held abortion to be legally acceptable if occurring before quickening (the fetus’s ability to stir in the womb) (Lee). Various anti-abortion statutes began to appear in the 1820s, and by 1900 abortion was largely illegal in every state. Some states did include provisions allowing for abortion in limited circumstances; generally with the purpose of protecting the woman's life or pregnancies related to rape or incest (Kauthen). This nation-wide ban of abortion only lasted for a couple decades. Roe vs. Wade is one of the most pivotal Supreme Court cases with regards to the abortion movement. By the end of the hearing, the courts decided that abortion was a constitutionally protected right of women and their right to privacy (Garlikov). This decision laid the foundation for legal arguments and, even today, is still taken into consideration as a precedent of common law. Roe vs. Wade made it possible for any women to receive an abortion at any time and for any reason, and women did just that.
Women should have the right to decide whether or not they would like to have an abortion. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines abortion as; “the termination of a pregnancy after, accompanied by, resulting in, or closely followed by the death of the embryo or fetus.” The idea of a woman’s right to have an abortion being taken away is merely incomprehensible.
Wade in which a woman who wished to terminate a pregnancy was denied by a district attorney in Texas, citing a law at the time which stated that it was illegal for a woman to have an abortion in the state unless the pregnancy directly endangered the life of the mother. The case was brought all the way to the US supreme court where it was decided that abortions were protected under the 14th amendment to the US constitution, and that laws infringing on a woman's right to an abortion were unconstitutional (The Washington Post). This decision was particularly important because the supreme court, the highest court in the land, decided, that a woman had the right to do what she pleased with her body, including when she was pregnant, and that no state could attempt to infringe on that right by banning it. The government, in this circumstance, used its power to ensure that the rights of all citizens could not be infringed upon by state
This is unlike the case for the rich, who can travel to other places where they can procure safe abortions. In addition, the prohibition of abortion often defeats the purpose of bringing up a child. A child is often considered a fruit of love and passion among two consenting adults. However, in cases where a woman feels that she does not want or does not have the capacity to bring up a child, it goes without saying more children would be brought up in situations and homes that are less than loving. Indeed, the prohibition would result in unwanted children, which are often the most tragic cases in the society (Norgren et al, 2001).