Mississippi asks Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade

When Mississippi asked judges to take up the state’s case last June, the state stressed, however, that there was no need to set aside historic abortion precedent or refinement. major of this decision by the court in 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

“To be clear, the issues presented in this motion do not require the Court to set aside Roe deer or Casey,”Fitch then wrote.

When Magnolia state officials took the case to the High Court last year, conservative justices outnumbered liberals, 5-4. But with the death in September of Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the lightning fast confirmation of Judge Amy Coney Barrett in the following months, the court shifted to a more lopsided, 6-3, conservative stance.

In May, the court not only announced that it would hear the Mississippi case, but the majority appeared to signal a willingness to revisit the basic framework of Roe vs. Wade, writing explicitly that they wanted to hear arguments over whether states should be allowed to ban abortion before the fetal viability stage, which occurs around 24 weeks gestation.

Yet many judicial observers doubt that a majority of the court explicitly overturns Roe deer. Instead, the consensus appears to be that judges will increasingly allow restrictions while avoiding overturning the nearly half-century-old ruling directly.

The Center for Reproductive Rights, which raised the challenge that blocked Mississippi law, called the state’s new push to abolish the historic precedent “extreme and regressive,” warning in a statement: “Their goal is that the Supreme Court take away our right to control our own bodies and our own future, not just in Mississippi, but everywhere.

When Mississippi enacted the law in 2018, it was part of a wave of Republican-leaning states that banned abortion as early as six weeks pregnant. All of these laws have been blocked by lower courts, but may be allowed to enter into force depending on the Supreme Court ruling on the pending case.

The High Court has yet to announce when it will hear arguments in the Mississippi cases, but a ruling is expected by next June or July, just months before the mid-terms of 2022 in which both sides are expected to use. the issue of abortion to get voters. .