I'm not quite sure from your rant whether or not you get twinges against Christians only or against all religious people. If someone were to introduce themselves by saying, "I'm religious," but not identify the religion, would you still get the twinge?
The South Dakota ruling is an obvious legal test case. I really don't think that it's going to stop abortions in South Dakota. . . until it does, and then that law goes straight to the Supreme Court. And, honestly, I don't know what will happen to it there. I know that the great liberal panic is that the Evil Conservative Supreme Court of the U.S. is just waiting to pounce on Roe vs. Wade and smite it down with a flaming sword, thereby condemning all women to a lifetime of unwanted children and bloody death. But I don't think that will happen, for two reasons.
1. Roe vs. Wade doesn't do quite what people think it does. It's actually a legally shaky ruling that probably deserves to be struck down as soon as something better can be drafted in its place. Its effect is to make abortion legal in all fifty states, and it does so by invoking a complex network of privacy and interstate commerce rights that really isn't very convincing if you look at it with a legal eye. If RvW were struck down tomorrow, abortion would not be made uniformly illegal. Instead, the issue would be returned to the several states. Each state would then have to decide whether or not to ban abortion.
Now, the nutjobs would love to see every government do like South Dakota, but most of them won't. This is a ruling that's been in place for thirty years, and it can't be dismantled overnight. First of all, you'd be putting abortionists out of work. They might well mount a legal challege to that. Second, you'd start seeing women crossing state lines to get abortions. The difference between 1973, when RvW was enacted, and now, is the Internet. Women have much more access to instant interstate communication and would probably make up relatively efficient underground railroads to get poor women into states that allow abortion.
I think you'd end up with a national debate similar to the one surrounding the death penalty, which is legal in some states but not others. And the country would be deeply divided, the way that Texas executes hundreds while Illinois declares a moratorium. And I don't think that this is a situation that the lawmakers of the several states really want to see. Even the more rabid states might pause if the issue were actually handed to them on a plate.
2. The other current panic is that Bush has appointed two conservatives to the Court, let the killing begin. The thing is, though, that there have been many Supreme Court justices in the past whose views have changed over the time they sat on the bench. A Supreme Court appointment is for life, so Roberts and Alito no longer have to worry about pleasing a superior. They are no longer required to toe the party line in order to get re-elected or re-appointed. They are responsible only for interpreting the law in the company of their fellow justices.
And their fellow justices are very well-respected jurists. Roberts and Alito probably studied some of their opinions in law school. And, even though Roberts is Chief Justice, he's still the new kid, as is Alito. If these guys have to reconsider RvW, they will probably take a lot of time over it, hearing endless days of testimony and then consulting thoroughly with each other. And the justices do seem to have an influence on each other's decisions. They do have to come to a final panel decision, after all, and I don't think that it's beyond the realm of possibility that the more liberal justices might use their seniority to keep the new kids in line.
Many people were just incensed over the appointment of Clarence Thomas, for much the same reasons, but he's really faded into the background since. You never can tell what'll come up with a Supreme Court justice once they're firmly seated on the bench.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rosecarmine
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-26 02:14 pm (UTC)The South Dakota ruling is an obvious legal test case. I really don't think that it's going to stop abortions in South Dakota. . . until it does, and then that law goes straight to the Supreme Court. And, honestly, I don't know what will happen to it there. I know that the great liberal panic is that the Evil Conservative Supreme Court of the U.S. is just waiting to pounce on Roe vs. Wade and smite it down with a flaming sword, thereby condemning all women to a lifetime of unwanted children and bloody death. But I don't think that will happen, for two reasons.
1. Roe vs. Wade doesn't do quite what people think it does. It's actually a legally shaky ruling that probably deserves to be struck down as soon as something better can be drafted in its place. Its effect is to make abortion legal in all fifty states, and it does so by invoking a complex network of privacy and interstate commerce rights that really isn't very convincing if you look at it with a legal eye. If RvW were struck down tomorrow, abortion would not be made uniformly illegal. Instead, the issue would be returned to the several states. Each state would then have to decide whether or not to ban abortion.
Now, the nutjobs would love to see every government do like South Dakota, but most of them won't. This is a ruling that's been in place for thirty years, and it can't be dismantled overnight. First of all, you'd be putting abortionists out of work. They might well mount a legal challege to that. Second, you'd start seeing women crossing state lines to get abortions. The difference between 1973, when RvW was enacted, and now, is the Internet. Women have much more access to instant interstate communication and would probably make up relatively efficient underground railroads to get poor women into states that allow abortion.
I think you'd end up with a national debate similar to the one surrounding the death penalty, which is legal in some states but not others. And the country would be deeply divided, the way that Texas executes hundreds while Illinois declares a moratorium. And I don't think that this is a situation that the lawmakers of the several states really want to see. Even the more rabid states might pause if the issue were actually handed to them on a plate.
2. The other current panic is that Bush has appointed two conservatives to the Court, let the killing begin. The thing is, though, that there have been many Supreme Court justices in the past whose views have changed over the time they sat on the bench. A Supreme Court appointment is for life, so Roberts and Alito no longer have to worry about pleasing a superior. They are no longer required to toe the party line in order to get re-elected or re-appointed. They are responsible only for interpreting the law in the company of their fellow justices.
And their fellow justices are very well-respected jurists. Roberts and Alito probably studied some of their opinions in law school. And, even though Roberts is Chief Justice, he's still the new kid, as is Alito. If these guys have to reconsider RvW, they will probably take a lot of time over it, hearing endless days of testimony and then consulting thoroughly with each other. And the justices do seem to have an influence on each other's decisions. They do have to come to a final panel decision, after all, and I don't think that it's beyond the realm of possibility that the more liberal justices might use their seniority to keep the new kids in line.
Many people were just incensed over the appointment of Clarence Thomas, for much the same reasons, but he's really faded into the background since. You never can tell what'll come up with a Supreme Court justice once they're firmly seated on the bench.