A report released Monday night, citing a leaked draft opinion, broke the news that a majority of the U.S. Supreme Court will overturn Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, leaving state legislatures the right to determine if and when a women may obtain an abortion.
The decision’s underpinnings overturning long-standing precedent may also be applied in future cases including challenges to Griswold v. Connecticut, protecting the right to birth control. As a result, women will lose the right to determine when and whether to have children with the personal economic impact such a decision will entail.
Those of us in our late 70s or older experienced a time when a woman’s place was “barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen.” Education and employment opportunities were limited for women, particularly for married women because they might get pregnant. Now, five Supreme Court justices are poised to take away rights women have had for 50 years, which will change the lives and opportunities for all women.
We still have one right that cannot be taken away without an amendment to the Constitution: the right to vote. Women, and the men who support reproductive rights for women, need to use their vote for candidates for state legislatures and Congress who will support those rights.
Paula N. Singer
Lyman
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