Categories
Abortion Constitutionality

Michael Stokes Paulsen on the Dobbs case

Michael Stokes Paulsen has two excellent essays on Public Discourse discussing the Dobbs case, which may result in the overruling of Roe and Casey. Part I focuses on  “why Dobbs is the most important abortion case to reach the Court in nearly thirty years—since Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), the case in which a splintered Court, by the narrowest of 5-4 margins, reaffirmed Roe, not because a majority of the justices thought Roe was right, but on the basis of the judicial doctrine of “stare decisis.” Dobbs is important because it frames a direct challenge to Roe and Casey, forcing the Court to confront the legal indefensibility and radicalism of the Court’s pro-abortion jurisprudence. Dobbs poses the enormously important question whether Roe and Casey, two of the worst constitutional decisions of all time, were wrongly decided and should now, finally, be overruled. On the merits, I submit, the answer must be yes.

Part II considers “the question whether the doctrine of stare decisis legitimately can require, or even permit, the Court to adhere to a grievously wrong, legally insupportable precedent, simply because it is a precedent.” Paulsen’s answer is an emphatic no.

As Paulsen explains, “Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization is likely to make history.”

Richard Myers

Richard S. Myers, the Vice-President of UFL, is Professor of Law at Ave Maria School of Law, where he teaches Antitrust, Civil Procedure, Conflict of Laws, Constitutional Law, and Religious Freedom. He is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Kenyon College and earned his law degree at Notre Dame, where he won the law school's highest academic prize. He began his legal career by clerking for Judge John F. Kilkenny of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Professor Myers also worked for Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue in Washington, D.C. He taught at Case Western Reserve University School of Law and the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law before joining the Ave Maria faculty. He is a co-editor of St. Thomas Aquinas and the Natural Law Tradition: Contemporary Perspectives (Catholic University of American Press, 2004) and a co-editor of Encyclopedia of Catholic Social Thought, Social Science, and Social Policy (Scarecrow Press, 2007). He has also published extensively on constitutional law in law reviews and also testified before Congressional and state legislative hearings on life issues. Married to Mollie Murphy, who is also on the faculty at Ave Maria School of Law, they are the proud parents of six children - Michael, Patrick, Clare, Kathleen, Matthew, and Andrew. http://www.avemarialaw.edu/index.cfm?event=faculty.bio&pid=11705E7D4E0111010366