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why was abortion unconstitutional
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The Texas anti-abortion law has taken the country’s attention by storm. It is an issue on many different woman’s minds, especially those who live in the state of Texas. The new laws are forcing many woman to have to cross state lines in order to receive an abortion and medical care. This includes woman who needs abortions due to preexisting medical conditions and those who are carrying fetuses which are diseased and are expected not to be born as healthy babies. The Texas Governor Rick Perry and Senator Ted Cruz are leading the fight for the abortion laws to become permanent, laws that are considered the strictest abortion laws that this country has ever seen.
In October 2013, a Judge quickly ruled the law unconstitutional under the United States Constitution and blocked it. It was found that the new law placed a heavy burden on women who wished to end their pregnancies for whatever reason (Tomlinson). This block was later overturned and the majority of the law was reinstated. “District Judge Lee Yeakel wrote that the regulations violated the rights of abortion doctors to do what they think is best for their patients and their health, and would unreasonably restrict a woman's access to abortion clinics (Tomlinson).” New regulations requires doctors to have admitting privileges at hospitals within 30 miles distance of the approved abortion clinics. “Yeakel also partially blocked new restrictions on pregnancy-ending drugs, saying they "may not be enforced against any physician who determines, in appropriate medical judgment, to perform a medication-abortion using the off-label protocol for the preservation of the life or health of the mother (Rauf).” The goal of the Texas legislature is to completely abolish abortion within thei...
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Eckholm, Erik. "In Reversal, Court Allows Texas Laws on Abortion." 31 October 2013. www.nytimes.com. Online Article. 6 November 2013.
Hagle, Will. "Laws Forcing Women To Cross State Lines For Abortions." 11 November 2013. www.opposingviews.com. 2013. 11 November 2013.
Martin, Brittney. "Some Texas Abortion Clinics Shutdown After New Law." 24 September 2013. www.dallasnews.com. 2013. 6 November 2013.
Mildenberg, Esme E. Deprez and David. "Texas Abortion Clinics Need Million Dollar Fixes to Stay Open." 15 July 2013. www.bloomberg.com. Online Article. 6 November 2013.
Rauf, David Saleh. "Federal Judge Rules on Texas Abortion Law." 28 October 2013. www.chron.com. Online Article. 6 November 2013.
Tomlinson, Chris. "Federal Judge Declares Texas Anti-Abortion Law Unconstitutional." 28 October 2013. www.talkingpointsmemo.com. Online Article. 6 November 2013.
In 1971, Norma McCorvey or Jane Roe, filled a case against the district attorney of Dallas County, Henry Wade, because he enforced a Texas law that prohibited abortion unless the abortion was needed medically, to save the mother’s life. Being a single, pregnant woman , Roe did not have the choice to have an abortion because the pregnancy was not endangering her life. Plus, Roe could not afford to travel to have the operation done safely. As a result, Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington, two lawyers that graduated from the University of Texas Law School, claimed a lawsuit against the abortion laws in Texas because they violated Roe’s constitutional rights. Besides Roe’s two laywers, Hallford, a licensed physician, and a childless married couple known as the Does supported Roe’s case. The lawsuit against Wade was filed in a Texas Federal Court. The Texas Federal Court heard the case on December 13th, 1971 and again, on October 11th, 1972. After the examination of Weddington and Coffee’s argument against Jay Floyd’s, the lawyer for Wade during the first argument, and Robert C. Flower’s, the lawyer for Texas in the second argument, the court ruled in Roe’s favor by claiming that the law did violate the Constitution. Consequently, Wade appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
On January 22, 1973 the court issued its opinion with a 7-2 majority voting to strike down the Texas law. State laws outlawing abortion were set aside by the court, permitting abortions during the first three months of pregnancy and setting standards for regulations after that time to safeguard the women's health. The Supreme Court declared all but the least restrictive state statues unconstitutional. Noting that early abortions had become safer than childbirth and reasoning that the word "person" in the constitution "does not include the unborn." The Court
The facts of this case show that Roe, who at the time was a single woman, decided to challenge the State of Texas’s abortions laws. The law in that state stated that it was a felony to obtain or attempt an abortion except on medical advice to save the life of the mother (Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 93 S. Ct. 705, 1973). At the time many illegal abortions were being performed in back alleys and in very unsanitary conditions. Therefore, some states began to loosen up on abortion restrictions, in which some women found it easy to travel to another state where the abortion laws were less restrictive and they could find a doctor was willing to endorse the medical requirement for an abortion. Unfortunately, less fortunate or poor women could seldom travel outside their own state to get the treatment, which started to raise questions of fairness. Also, many of the laws were vague; therefore many doctors really didn’t know whether they were committing ...
The Roe v. Wade case, brought before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1973, resulted in the Court’s determination that women have the constitutional right to have an abortion prior to when the fetus is viable, meaning when it can survive on its own outside the woman’s womb. Since this decision was handed down, Roe v. Wade has been the subject of a constant, divisive public and political debate regarding its moral, ethical and constitutional merits. The plaintiff, Norma McCorvey, who represented all women who are pregnant in the case, used the alias “Jane Roe.” The defendant was the county of Dallas, Texas. Roe’s claim charged that the abortion law in Texas was in violation of the constitutional rights of her and all other pregnant women. The Supreme
Pfeifer, Michael Pearce. "Abandoning Error: Self-Correction by the Supreme Court." Abortion and the Constitution: Reversing Roe v. Wade Through the Courts. Horan, Grant, Cunningham, eds. Washington,D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1987.
The debate of abortion continues to be a controversial problem in society and has been around for many decades. According to Jone Lewis, “In the United States, abortion laws began to appear in the 1820’s, forbidding abortion after the fourth month of pregnancy” (1). This indicates that the abortion controversy has been debated far back into American history. Beginning in the 1900’s, legalized abortion became a major controversy. In 1965, all fifty states in the United States banned abortion; however, that was only the beginning of the controversy that still rages today (Lewis 1). After abortion was officially banned in the United States, groups such as the National Abortion Rights Action League worked hard on a plan to once again legalize abortion in the United States (Lewis 1). It wasn’t until 1970 when the case of Roe (for abortion) v. Wade (against abortion) was brought...
In the long run T.R.A.P. laws are trying to close abortion clinics down, rather than regulate them. Among these laws is H.B. 2 in Texas. According to “Trapped” H.B. 2 has closed down numerous abortion clinics all over Texas by requiring licensed physicians to receive transfer agreements or active admitting privileges within thirty miles of the clinic- which can be close to impossible to obtain in politically hostile states. Outpatient clinics perform the majority of abortions in the United States. “Trapped” claims, “Less than 1% of outpatient abortion clinics experience a complication that requires hospitalization” (Porter). However, the law also requires every abortion, even the abortion pill, to be done in an ambulatory surgical center. H.B. 2 also requires a patient to come in for four different visits with the same
In 1973, in what has become a landmark ruling for women’s rights, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of a woman’s right to an abortion. Ever since, individual states have adopted, altered, and/or mutilated the edict to fit their agendas – Texas included. However, the decision made by the justices in Roe v. Wade didn’t set clear cut, inarguable demarcation lines, which has allowed the fiery debate to consume the nation. Rather than establishing a legal ruling of what life is, or is not, the Supreme Court has remained silent on the issue.
Roe and her attorneys asked the federal district court to declare that the Texas abortion statute violated her rights under the Constitution. They also asked the court t...
This was soon modified into language that has remained substantially unchanged to the present time....Jane Roe, a single woman who was residing in Dallas County, Texas, instituted this federal action in March 1970 against the District Attorney of the county. She sought a declaratory judgment that the Texas criminal abortion statutes were unconstitutional on their face, and an injunction restraining the defendant from enforcing the statutes.Roe alleged that she was unmarried and pregnant; that she wished to terminate her pregnancy
On the side of those who not only advocate the bill but created it there is a very complicated idealism rooted in religion, state rights, and morality. As chairwoman Jane Nelson has said herself, “We [state government] have every right to exclude abortion providers and their affiliates from this program” (Aaronson, 2013). This view comes from a stand mixed with the role different parts of government play and the moral view of what abortion truly is; a simple medical procedure or an act of murder. Despite their goals to remove abortion and abortion providers from the medical providers of Texas, they do feel that they also “have a responsibility to ensure that [the women of Texas] have alternatives in their community” (Aaronson, 2013) and claim this is where the focus of their legal battles will be heading towards. For the argument of women’s health, many of those for the new bill believe that it will improve health care for women across the state, as they believe “the ideal world is one without abortion,” (Wissert, 2013) and I think most agree. Those for the bill conclude that this is the way to create a saf...
In the year March 1970, a woman dubbed Jane Roe took federal action against Texas abortion laws. These laws prevented Roe from terminating her pregnancy because abortions were only allowed in the scenario that the fetus was harming the life of the mother (Rosenbaum 63). Because Roe wasn’t in any way harmed by her pregnancy, she could not get an abortion. “Roe believed that TX statutes were unconstitutionally vague and that they abridged her right of personal privacy, protected by the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments” (Rosenbaum 64). She wanted an abortion done professionally in a clean and safe environment (Rosenbaum 63). Women before the legalization of abortion would resort to unsafe methods to terminate their baby (Tribe 113).
In 1971 Linda Coffee and Sarah Wellington sued on Norma McCorvey behalf, arguing that the state of Texas abortion law was unconstitutional. Defending the state of Texas was Henry Wade, district attorney of Dallas. The state of Texas only allowed abortions in cases where the mother’s life was at risk or the women was sexually assaulted. After two years of hearing evidence, the US Supreme Court affirms legality, a women’s right to abort, and that a right to privacy being implied by the Ninth and Fourteenth amendments in a 7-2 decision in 1973. It had encompassed a woman’s decision whether or not to stop her pregnancy. No states could restrict abortion during first three months or trimester of a pregnancy.
Jackson, L.J. "A Right-to-life Movement Reborn: Friendlier State Legislatures Lead to a Rise in Anti-abortion Legislation." ABA Journal, 97.8 (2011): 20.