Peter Merrill, Campus Carrier news editor
Elizabeth Montiel, Campus Carrier staff writer
On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in a 6-3 decision, asserting that abortion is not a right and that laws concerning it should be left up to individual states.
Although abortion rights have been hotly contested and chipped away at over the past 50 years, they were upheld several times by the court. When this decision came down, the medial procedure was immediately restricted in many states that had trigger laws, or laws that were already on the books in states but were overruled by the federal law. Because of this, women who are seeking abortions in states with trigger laws must now travel out of state.
Abigail Vegter, assistant professor of political science, said that many of the current abortion rulings would disproportionately affect poor women.
“Something that’s important to think about is that this right is [only] taken away from certain people,” Vegter said. “If you have money, you can drive or fly to a state in which abortion is legal. So, if you are an economic elite or even middle class, you may easily travel to receive an abortion in a state where it is still protected.”
The restrictions on abortion in Georgia are especially prohibitive. Like many other states, Georgia has a ‘heartbeat’ law which disallows women from getting abortions after 6 weeks of pregnancy, which is the time when a fetal heartbeat can first be detected. According to Vegter, most women are not even aware that they are pregnant before 6 weeks.
“Most women don’t find out that they’re pregnant until they miss a period,” said Vegter. “That would normally happen 2 weeks after conception, which is very early. Now how we determine the age of a fetus is a little weird because most doctors will go from a past missed period, so if you were 6 weeks pregnant, the fetus would be about 4 weeks old. This becomes very difficult because most women don’t know they are pregnant at 6 weeks.”
In addition to the 6 weeks law, Georgians must receive counselling 24 hours before an abortion is performed.
Despite the recent changes, The Health Center at Berry College will continue to provide the same services as before. Students are able to obtain condoms and pregnancy tests when needed. Sexual health counselling and women’s and men’s health and fitness classes are available. Melanie Merrin, assistant director at the health center, said that oral contraceptives can also be prescribed with options to be acquired for free.
“A lot of our students would fall in this category: people who do not have the financial means or the transportation.” said Merrin.
With this decision affecting many of Berry students including those with financial difficulties, a majority of the resources offered at the health center are free of charge.
“The services are available on demand, anyone who wants condoms is able to come in and get them,” Merrin said. “An increase in demand would mean an increase in services. We could also soon see an increase in sexual service awareness to make sure students are informed of the resources offered and making full use of them.”
Vegter said that since this decision, Republican states have seen higher turnout with voting results trending towards Democrats and left-leaning policies. In Alaska, Republican Sarah Palin lost a special election to Democrat Mary Peltola and voters in Kansas voted against an attempt to strip the right to an abortion in their state.
Michael Bailey, associate professor of political science, said that while the court ruling would likely have an effect on the upcoming midterms, it would most likely be a moderate, non-trivial, boost for the Democrats, as the majority of new voters are women. Bailey also said that the effects on this ruling could potentially go beyond abortion rights.
“There’s all sorts of rights we have that are not stated in the constitution,” Bailey said. “Many rights are stated in the text of the constitution, but we as Americans hold as very precious a number of rights that we all assume are somewhere in the constitution that are not actually stated. I think everyone would protest, for example, if the government said, ‘you guys are making bad decisions with marriages; the divorce rate is 40%. We’re going to start doing arranged marriages. Then let’s say the government said, ‘okay, if you have a right to choose who you want to marry, show me where it says that in the constitution. And you wouldn’t be able to.”
Because of this the Supreme Court says that if an unstated right is a fundamental part of American history or integral to order and liberty, it will be protected. This ruling raises questions about contraceptives, same-sex marriage and interracial marriage among other presumed rights because abortion was a presumed right before it was struck down by the recent ruling. None of those rights have been central to the American way of life, and some are relatively new. While Justice Samuel Alito said in his majority opinion that this ruling would affect only abortion and nothing else, both the dissenting opinion and Justice Clarence Thomas’ concurring opinion suggest that future action might be taken against other presumed liberties. Congress is currently trying to codify these rights into laws, would make them more difficult for the Supreme Court to overturn, but the door is open for the court to strip more liberties away.
“I would remind conservatives that just because the word ‘abortion’ is not found in the constitution doesn’t mean that there may not be a right in favor of it,” Bailey said. “There are all sorts of rights that we take for granted that aren’t in the constitution: rights like marriage, rights like travel, rights like gainful employment. What I would remind liberals and Democrats is that this ruling by the court does not ban abortion, it simply takes that battleground to the states and if people want to continue to fight for the right to abortion, they’re going to have to focus their energies on the state level. And they should, they should stay involved in politics.”