Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization: “The Roar of a Wave that Could Drown the Whole World”

Principal Speaker: James E. Fleming, The Honorable Paul J. Liacos Professor of Law Commentators: Aziza Ahmed, Professor of Law and R. Gordon Butler Scholar in International Law Gary Lawson, William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professor & Associate Dean for Intellectual Life. In Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which had protected the constitutional right of pregnant persons to decide whether to terminate their pregnancies. Justice Alito’s 5-4 majority opinion in Dobbs denied that it “cast doubt” on any other precedents. But Justice Thomas’s concurring opinion said the quiet part out loud: that all of the substantive due process decisions protecting personal autonomy and bodily integrity—including the rights to use contraceptives, to “same-sex” intimacy, and to “same-sex” marriage—were “demonstrably erroneous” and should be overruled. Are these rights next? Is the Supreme Court just getting started?