Roe V. Wade And Planned Parenthood Vs. Casey

The ruling of Roe v. Wade included three key ideas. The first key idea was that women had the right to choose to have an abortion during the stage of pregnancy when the fetus had little chance of survival outside the womb and that women were able to obtain an abortion within unreasonable interferences from the state. The second idea confirmed a state’s power to restrict abortions when a fetus could live outside the womb, except in the case when the mother’s life was at risk. The final key idea that was decided in the ruling was that the state has interests in both the health of the women and the life of the fetus (Brannen and Hanes, 2001).

There have been many debates over abortion. One of the more famous acts in history about abortion is Roe vs. Wade on January 22, 1973. In this case the U.S. Supreme Court recognized that the constitutional right to privacy extends to a woman’s right to make her own personal medical decisions. This includes the decision to have an abortion without interference from politics and regulations, or religion. Therefore, a state may not ban abortion prior to viability.

"The Court today is correct in holding that the right asserted by Jane Roe is embraced within the personal liberty protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. It is evident that the Texas abortion statute infringes that right directly. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine a more complete abridgment of a constitutional freedom than that worked by the inflexible criminal statute now in force in Texas. The question then becomes whether the state interests advanced to justify this abridgment can survive the 'particularly careful scrutiny' that the Fourteenth Amendment here requires. The asserted state interests are protection of the health and safety of the pregnant woman, and protection of the potential

However, everything that was ruled by Supreme Court in the Roe v. Wade case was contradicted, In1992, the Supreme court case “...Planned Parenthood V. Casey that said an abortion regulation was unconstitutional if it had 'the purpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of woman seeking an abortion of a nonviable fetus.'” (Levy). This court ruled that the states had the right to restrict a woman's right to an abortion and prohibit public funding for the poor women that can not afford an abortion.

Before the 1973 ruling of the case of Roe v Wade, the estimated average number of illegal abortions every year ranged from 200,000 to 1.5 million. The methods used were violently dangerous including women ingesting toxic substances such as bleach and detergents which often times was ineffective. Women around the country were concerned that the anti-abortion laws conflicted with a person’s right to privacy and equal protection given by the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution. Gale University’s William Sullivan explains ”The right to abort unborn children is not specifically protected by the Constitution, and prior to 1973, abortion legislation had been understood to be limited to the power of the states per the Tenth

Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833(1992), was case reaffirming the Roe v.Wade decision. It further challenged the constitutionally of several statues in the State of Pennsylvania

Planned parenthood V Casey: An abortion law required informed consent as well as a 24 hour waiting period prior to any abortion procedure in Pennsylvania. Any married woman had to state that her husband was in fact knowledgeable of this intention. Additionally, any minor seeking an abortion requires the consent of a parent. These laws were challenged by many clinics specializing in abortion, as well as many doctors. An appellate court upheld all of these stipulations with the exclusion of the married woman.

In 1973, the Supreme Court made a decision in one of the most controversial cases in history, the case of Roe v. Wade (410 U.S. 113 (1973)), in which abortion was legalized and state anti-abortion statues were struck down for being unconstitutional. This essay will provide a brief history and analysis of the issues of this case for both the woman’s rights and the states interest in the matter. Also, this essay will address the basis for the court ruling in Roe’s favor and the effects this decision has had on subsequent cases involving a woman’s right to choose abortion in the United States. The court’s decision created legal precedent for several subsequent abortion restriction cases and has led to the development of legislation to protect women’s health rights. Although the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade was a historic victory for women’s rights, it is still an extremely controversial subject today and continues to be challenged by various groups.

The decision of Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court case that legalized abortion in the United States, had a very evident and profound impact on the social and political climates of the United States. Before the case, it had seemed that abortion was a settled issue in America: a majority of people opposed the practice, and a majority of states had abortion bans. However, by the 1960’s, political factions and campaigns were rising up and stirring the waters of reproductive rights. Abortion had changed during the courses of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, morphing from a private practice of the people into a great political divide. Abortion was actually easily accessible during the Nineteenth Century, but the rise of religious fundamentalism compelled citizens to become involved in either the protection of the fetus or the defense of reproductive rights. Roe v. Wade had been either labeled as the legal settling of the abortion issue or the igniter of change in regards to abortion. The decision not only affected the minds of the people, but the decision had also set a legal precedent that affected more than thirty Supreme Court cases that later dealt with abortion (Planned Parenthood).

Casey (1992) was centered on four statutes, which dealt with access to obtaining an abortion. The statues required a woman seeking an abortion give informed consent, that a minor obtain parental consent, that a married woman notify her husband that she was having the procedure, and finally that clinics would provide certain information to a woman and then would wait 24 hours before deciding to perform the procedure. All of these statues but the one involving the married woman were upheld. This ruling continued to narrow the scope of a woman’s control over obtaining abortion, giving more and more power back to the states to regulate as they saw

Casey. In 1992, the case Planned Parenthood arose as a case that challenged restrictive Pennsylvania state laws that restricted abortion. It required doctors to inform the mother of health risks, required women to inform their husbands, minors to inform their parents, and imposed a twenty-four hour wait period before the procedure could be completed (505 U.S. 833, 1992). The District Court of Pennsylvania found all of these provisions to be unconstitutional under the legal reasoning in Roe. In the Appellate Courts, all of the restrictions were declared constitutional except for the spousal notification clause (505 U.S. 833, 1992) When it reached the Supreme Court, there were new justices on the bench, comprised of all Republican appointees. Casey gained a great deal of media attention for the possibility that the conservative bench could overturn Roe. In a 5-4 decision, the Court's reasoning reaffirmed Roe, but upheld most of the Pennsylvania provisions using the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The opinion contained a novel standard to determine the validity of abortion restrictions, thus eliminating the previous trimester rule. The new standard asks whether the restriction has the purpose of imposing an "undue burden", which is a "substantial obstacle in the path of the woman seeking an abortion before the fetus attains viability" (505 U.S. 833, 1992). Under

4. In Planned Parenthood of S.E. Pennsylvania v. Casey (1992), the Court placed parental involvement firmly within a broader set of legal principles governing a woman's constitutional right to an abortion. Parental involvement and other regulations were constitutional so long that they did not place an "undue burden" on a woman's ability to acquire an

In 1992, Roe v. Wade was upheld in Casey v. Planned Parenthood. However, the Supreme Court had become significantly more conservative in that time, and this ruling favored the states‘ rights to establish tighter abortion restrictions. In Pennsylvania, women were only permitted first trimester abortions if they had been given information about the fetus’s gestational state and the dangers of having the procedure. A married women was also required to inform her husband prior to having the abortion, and minors had to seek approval from at least one parent unless given a legal bypass. On top of these restrictions, there was also a mandatory 24-hour waiting period (McBride, “Casey v. Planned Parenthood”).

Abortion did not immediately engrave itself onto public agenda; it had help. The legal debate over the use of birth control proved to be the catalyst needed to propel abortion to the Supreme Court and into the ranks of public policy. The birth control movement was significant to Roe v. Wade because it served as a key in which to unlock the gates of the Supreme Court. The Supreme Courts decision to hear Griswold v. Connecticut, a case that challenged the Connecticut statute prohibiting anyone to “use any drug, article, or instrument to prevent conception or to give assistance or counsel in its use (p.39)”, is arguably the most significant factor in the Court’s

The Supreme Court Case Planned Parenthood vs. Casey stated this, a married woman is required, except in limited circumstances, to notify her husband before going forward with the abortion of their baby or babies. Planned Parenthood vs. Casey was mostly to help the basic ruling of the Roe vs. Wade Case, the state is prohibited from banning most abortions. The Planned Parenthood part in the case was from the Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania. They filed a lawsuit against the state, arguing the Abortion Control Act was violated in the Supreme Court’s ruling of the Roe vs. Wade Court Case. Casey’s part in the court case ruled that the states should be given the right to regulate abortions to protect the health of the mother or the fetus that is growing inside of her. The Supreme Court's decision of this case ruled they were staying with their first ruling in the Roe vs. Wade Case, which stated that women have the right to privacy if they wanted an abortion and the state could not interfere with the decision of the woman and her family. The Court put in place five provisions. These provisions, as they applied, had to be met in order to receive an abortion.