Are fetuses people? Too bad the nation’s highest court has gone silent and doesn’t really want to say.
Current Events :
Earlier this year, the US Supreme Court handed conservatives an early Christmas present by repealing Roe v Wade and effectively making abortion illegal in almost every state in the country. However, their ruling has since opened a veritable Pandora’s Box of problems and reintroduced the question: when does life actually become life?
For example, a pregnant woman argued that she was legally permitted to use the carpool lane (requiring 2 or more passengers inside a vehicle) after the Supreme Court ruled that life begins at conception and that her car held at least 2 “humans.” Other cases attempting to compare an unborn fetus to an actual living human also popped up unexpectedly.
One such case involved an appeal to the Supreme Court by a Catholic group and 2 women who challenged a 2019 state law in Rhode Island regarding the human status of unborn fetuses. The 2 women, who were pregnant when the case was first filed, sued on behalf of their fetuses and used the Supreme Court decision to consider them full-fledged humans. Although a lower court ruled against fetuses having proper legal standing, lawyers for the Catholic group and the women argued that the Supreme Court ruling guaranteed that fetuses should have due process and equal protection rights under the law.
Now, the high court is beginning to recognize that perhaps it may have created more harm than necessary via its ruling. In fact, Justice Samuel Alito — who was one of the greatest proponents in overturning Roe v Wade — says the court took no position on “if and when prenatal life is entitled to any of the rights enjoyed after birth.”
Or, in other words, he and his fellow (conservative) justices are backpedaling.
When does life begin? Are fetuses actual humans? Should the unborn have the same rights as those who have already been born? Or, has the US Supreme Court already screwed up everything?
OK WASSUP! covers Current Events:
Are fetuses human?
NBC: The Supreme Court declined Tuesday to decide whether fetuses are entitled to constitutional rights in light of its June ruling overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, which had legalized abortion nationwide, steering clear for now of another front in America’s culture wars. The justices turned away an appeal by a Catholic group and two women of a lower court’s ruling holding that fetuses lack the proper legal standing to challenge a 2019 state law codifying the right to abortion in line with the Roe precedent. The two women, who were pregnant when the case was first filed, sued on behalf of their fetuses and later gave birth. Conservative Justice Samuel Alito wrote in June’s ruling overturning the abortion rights precedent that the court took no position in the decision on “if and when prenatal life is entitled to any of the rights enjoyed after birth.” Some Republicans at… Read more »