The Past, Present, and Future of Abortion Rights

On the night of May 2, Politico published a draft Supreme Court majority opinion, authored by Justice Samuel Alito, that would overrule the seminal abortion rights cases Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. While the draft opinion was from February — and the Court has yet to release a binding decision — the news sent seismic shocks through the nation. 

Since Justices Brent Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett were confirmed, activists on both sides of the abortion debate have expected the Court to roll back at least some of the reproductive rights enshrined in Roe, which was handed down in 1973, and Casey, decided in 1992. But many were still taken aback at the sweeping nature of Alito’s draft, especially in light of recently-passed laws in several states that would ban abortion entirely if Roe is overturned. 

University of California, Irvine, School of Law Chancellor’s Professor Michele Goodwin joins Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky to talk about how we got to this moment and what a post-Roe legal and political landscape might look like. Goodwin, director of UCI Law’s Center for Biotechnology and Global Health Policy, has written extensively about reproductive rights and the implications for women of the abortion debate, including in the book Policing the Womb: Invisible Women and the Criminalization of Motherhood, and in several articles with Chemerinsky. 

About: 

More Just from Berkeley Law is a podcast about how law schools can and must play a role in solving society’s most difficult problems. 

The rule of law — and the role of the law — has never been more important. In these difficult times, law schools can, and must, play an active role in finding solutions. But how? Each episode of More Just starts with a problem, then explores potential solutions, featuring Dean Erwin Chemerinsky as well as other deans, professors, students, and advocates, about how they’re making law schools matter. 

Have a question about teaching or studying law, or a topic you’d like Dean Chemerinsky to explore? Email us at morejust@berkeley.edu and tell us what’s on your mind. 

For a transcript, please visit the episode page on the Berkeley Law podcast hub.

Related:

The Enormous Consequences of Overruling Roe v. Wade

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