The End of Roe v Wade and New Legal Frontiers on the Constitutional Right to Abortion

Authors

I. Glenn Cohen, Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics, Harvard University
Melissa Murray, Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Network, New York University
Lawrence O. Gostin, Georgetown University - Law Center - O'Neill Institute for National and Global Health LawFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

7-8-2022

DOI

10.1001/jama.2022.12397

Abstract

On June 24, 2002, the US Supreme Court ended the constitutional right to abortion in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization. The Court’s majority decision authored by Justice Samuel Alito was substantially the same as a draft opinion leaked a month earlier. The regulation of abortion will now be decided by the states, with about half currently or will soon ban or severely restrict abortion access. In this Viewpoint, we explain the Dobbs ruling and what it means for physicians, public health, and society.

We focus on new legal frontiers in the constitutional right to abortion, including medication abortion and FDA preemption of state bans, restricting travel to states that permit abortions, and access to contraception, miscarriage management, and assisted reproductive technologies such as in vitro fertilization.

Publication Citation

The Journal of the American Medical Association, published online first, July 8, 2022.

Scholarly Commons Citation

Cohen, I. Glenn; Murray, Melissa; and Gostin, Lawrence O., "The End of Roe v Wade and New Legal Frontiers on the Constitutional Right to Abortion" (2022). Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works. 2460.
https://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/facpub/2460