Criminal Abortion Laws in Texas - Essay Example

Criminal Law Case Report: Roe v. Wade Background Facts This report addresses criminal abortion laws in Texas and in Georgia. The Texas abortion laws date back to 1854 and they made it a criminal act to "procure an abortion" or to attempt an abortion. An exception was provided when a physician declared that an abortion was necessary to save the life of the mother. The exception is not relevant in this case. Although a class action, this case centers on the facts involving Jane Roe. Roe was a single woman who became pregnant. She argued that she could not obtain a safe abortion in Texas, that she did not have enough money to travel to another state to secure an abortion, and that the criminal abortion laws in Texas violated a variety of constitutional principles. She therefore initiated a legal action in order to challenge the constitutionality of the criminal abortion laws in Texas. There were additional plaintiffs, however, the facts were quite different than those of Roe. In particular, these plaintiffs were not pregnant and they did not present the same sense of urgency and relevance as existed in the case of Roe. The United State Supreme Court dismissed these plaintiffs because they lacked legal "standing" and because the issues in their cases were not yet decidable or "justiceable." This report, consequently, will focus on the specifics and the legal merits of the case involving Roe. The main questions presented are whether the Texas criminal abortion laws violate certain constitutional principles and provisions. Legal Background Roe, a resident of Dallas, Texas, initiated this lawsuit in a federal court. The defendant was the District Attorney of the county in which she resided. She didn't sue for money; instead she requested that the federal court issue a declaratory judgment stating that the criminal abortion laws violated the federal constitution and she further requested that the federal court issue an injunction to prohibit the District Attorney from enforcing the criminal abortion statutes. "She claimed that the Texas statutes were unconstitutionally vague and that they abridged her right of personal privacy, protected by the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments" (Roe v. Wade, 1973). Roe's case was argued before a three-judge group of the federal trial court. Roe was successful as the federal trial court found that the ninth and fourteenth amendments did, in fact, extend to women a "fundamental right" to decide whether or not to have children. The federal court further decided that the Texas criminal abortion laws were "unconstitutionally vague" and that Roe was entitled to a declaratory judgment. A difficulty, however, was that because the criminal abortion laws were declared void, the injunctive relief requested by Roe was dismissed. Neither party was satisfied. Roe appealed from the rejection of her request for injunctive relief and the District Attorney appealed from the declaration that the criminal abortion laws were unconstitutional and therefore void. Traditionally, cases are appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit. In this case, by contrast, a "protective appeal" was made to the 5th Circuit and also directly to the United States Supreme Court. The Supreme Court noted some awkwardness with the skipping of the intermediate appellate court, but at the same time noted that it had discretion to review the appeals. Therefore, the Supreme Court proceeded to review the case on its merits. Legal Discussion: The United States Supreme Court Justice Blackmun was compelled to address a number of preliminary issues prior to addressing the constitutionality of the Texas criminal abortion laws. There was a suggestion that Roe did not have legal standing to bring this case because she was not pregnant at certain times during the course of the litigation. The Supreme Court dismissed these arguments by stating that pregnancy is by its very nature a limited condition and that the legal issues were of sufficient important to decide. Roe thus had legal standing and her issues were relevant rather than "moot." The Supreme Court then addressed the constitutionality of the Texas criminal abortion laws. The opinion begins by noting the historical justifications for the enactment and the enforcement of criminal abortion laws. The main reasons were the need to preserve a sense of traditional morality, the fact that abortion techniques and practices were "hazardous" in the past, and that states had an important interest or duty to protect and safeguard "prenatal life." The Supreme Court dismissed the first two justifications as obsolete and proceeded to analyze the constitutional issues in light of the third justification. Although there is no specific mention of a right of privacy in the American constitution, the Supreme Court stated that they do recognize certain privacy interests and what they termed "zones of privacy." These privacy interests have been based on the provisions of the First Amendment, the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, the Ninth Amendment, and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court emphasized the concept of the privacy right rather than a particular source, stating that "This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough" (Roe v. Wade, 1973). On this basis, the Supreme Court decided that women do have constitutional rights regarding whether or not to have children. These rights were not absolute, and the Texas legislature retained an interest, though significantly diluted, in regulating the health of the mother and the prenatal child. In sum, the Texas criminal abortion laws were declared unconstitutional and the Supreme Court issued guidelines for states to follow when enacting laws dealing with abortion. A concurring opinion was written by Justice Stewart agreed with the result, but it offered a slightly different rationale. In particular, Justice Stewart believed that the right of privacy in this case ought to have been traced specifically to the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Justice Blackmun's broader notion of privacy was, in effect, too broad for Justice Potter. A dissenting opinion was written by Justice Rehnquist. He was troubled by the underlying facts of the case. He felt that Roe had not demonstrated legal standing, because there was no evidence of the stage of her pregnancy when she initially filed the complaint, and because he did not interpret the constitution as possessing a privacy right in these circumstances. He believed that this was an unjustified extension of the legal concept of substantive due process. The Rule Established by the Case This case established both rules and guidelines. The most important finding was that the 14th Amendment included a right to privacy regarding a woman's right to terminate a pregnancy. State laws which restrict this privacy right are therefore unconstitutional. The Supreme Court, however, did reserve some power to the states and articulated a trimester approach to pregnancy and laws. A state's interest in regulating these types of decisions increases as the woman progresses in her pregnancy. In the final analysis, however, this decision severely restricted the ability of states to regulate abortion. Works Cited Kesler, C. R. "Roe vs. Wade 25 Years Later: A Decision Greatly Undermined." The San Diego Union-Tribune, 22 January 1998. < http://swissnet.ai.mit.edu/rauch/nvp/roe/kesler.html>. Mother Theresa's Letter to the US Supreme Court on Roe v. Wade. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 3 September 2006. http://swissnet.ai.mit.edu/rauch/nvp/roe/mothertheresa_roe.html. Roe v. Wade. 410 U.S. 113 (1973). Legal Information Institute, Supreme Court Collection: Cornell Law School. 3 September 2006. http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0410_0113_ZS.html. Woodward, B. "The Abortion Papers." The Washington Post, 22 January 1989. http://swiss.csail.mit.edu/rauch/nvp/roe/woodward.html. Read More