C_Clayton_Jones
Diamond Member
I always thought it should have been left to the states to decide...like it was before the SC decision. I do believe the Founding Fathers would have agreed with me on this one.
Actually not, no
The Framers were as much opposed to tyranny by the states as the Federal government.
I'm fascinated to know how you came to the twin conclusions of 1) this is "tyranny of the state", and 2) that the Framers were worried about such a thing (or that THEY would have considered this to be "tyranny of the state", for that matter).
Tyranny occurs when the state acts in such a manner as to deny its citizens a fundamental right, in this case the right to privacy:
The present case, then, concerns a relationship lying within the zone of privacy created by several fundamental constitutional guarantees. And it concerns a law which, in forbidding the use of contraceptives, rather than regulating their manufacture or sale, seeks to achieve its goals by means having a maximum destructive impact upon that relationship. Such a law cannot stand in light of the familiar principle, so often applied by this Court, that a
governmental purpose to control or prevent activities constitutionally subject to state regulation may not be achieved by means which sweep unnecessarily broadly and thereby invade the area of protected freedoms.
NAACP v. Alabama, 377 U.S. 288, 307. Would we allow the police to search the sacred precincts of marital bedrooms for telltale signs of the use of contraceptives? The [p486] very idea is repulsive to the notions of privacy surrounding the marriage relationship.
We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights -- older than our political parties, older than our school system. Marriage is a coming together for better or for worse, hopefully enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred. It is an association that promotes a way of life, not causes; a harmony in living, not political faiths; a bilateral loyalty, not commercial or social projects. Yet it is an association for as noble a purpose as any involved in our prior decisions.
Griswold v. Connecticut
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 to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. The detriment that the State would impose upon the pregnant woman by denying this choice altogether is apparent.
Roe v. Wade
When the state seeks to violate the right to privacy, therefore, by attempting to deny a woman access to abortion or otherwise manifest an undue burden to that end then the state has gone outside the bounds of its right to regulate its citizens, and has forfeited its authority to do so accordingly.
We know that the Framers were concerned about the right to privacy from the 4th Amendment:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
To be secure in ones person is clearly an admonition by the Framers to enact the utmost limitations on government, that however objectionable citizens may find the actions of others in the context of that right to privacy, those offended may not compel compliance of others through government means, and that other avenues must be explored to remedy the offensive activity within the bounds of privacy rights jurisprudence.
It was neither the intent nor responsibility of the Roe and Casey Courts to solve the problem of abortion; but merely to safeguard the integrity of the Constitution and its guarantee to all citizens of the right to be free from unwarranted government involvement in their private lives.