By James G. Hodge, Jr. and Jennifer L. Piatt
Surrounding the U.S. Supreme Court’s withdrawal of the longstanding constitutional right to abortion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization on June 24, 2022, multiple state supreme courts have done their own “about face” on reproductive rights. Motivated perhaps by the infamous leaked decision in Dobbs, the Iowa Supreme Court reversed its 2018 decision finding abortion protections in the state constitution, concluding on June 17, 2022 that no such fundamental right exists. Following a January 2023 decision rejecting a 6-week statutory ban as violating the state’s constitution, a reconstituted South Carolina Supreme Court found the ban constitutional in August 2023. Florida’s Supreme Court protected abortion as a fundamental privacy right under the state constitution in 1989 only to reverse its view on April 1, 2024.
Most recently, on April 9, 2024 a majority of the Arizona Supreme Court resurrected an 1864 territorial law banning all abortions except to save the life of the pregnant woman in Planned Parenthood v. Hazelrigg. That decision thrust Arizona into the realm of 14 other states with the most stringent restrictions nationally – no abortions with virtually no exceptions.
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