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In a raging dissent, the liberal justices on the bench slammed the Supreme Court's conservative majority for Friday's (June 24) ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade.
According to NBC News, Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan wrote a lengthy joint dissent that called out the Court's 6-3 decision to dismantle the landmark case that has protected the right to have an abortion for over 50 years. The "draconian" ruling curbs women's rights and turns back “their status as free and equal citizens,” the dissenting justices wrote.
Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan also pointed to the negative and potentially deadly impact that the overturn would disproportionately have on low-income women and women of color who seek abortion care.
The justices slammed the "cavalier" conservative majority for their "hypocrisy" in how they interpret the constitution. They concluded that the Court's majority found women undeserving of equal protection under the law.
“The majority would allow States to ban abortion from conception onward because it does not think forced childbirth at all implicates a woman’s rights to equality and freedom,” the justices said in their dissent. “Today’s Court, that is, does not think there is anything of constitutional significance attached to a woman’s control of her body and the path of her life.”
“Whatever the exact scope of the coming laws, one result of today’s decision is certain: the curtailment of women’s rights, and of their status as free and equal citizens,” the three wrote.
The justice went on to firmly state that the majority opinion "says that from the very moment of fertilization, a woman has no rights to speak of."
“With sorrow — for this Court, but more, for the many millions of American women who have today lost a fundamental constitutional protection — we dissent,” Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan concluded.
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