Tuesday, January 24, 2012

The dishonesty of Roe vs. Wade

In the Washington Examiner, Timothy Carney lists a variety of legal critiques which legal scholars in favor of legal abortion have leveled against Roe v. Wade and contrasts those criticisms with the praise given the decision by President Barack Obama.
So when President Obama praises the decision on its 39th anniversary, he either shows a strikingly poor understanding of constitutional law (especially for a Harvard Law grad), or he buys into the dishonesty that pervades the opinion and its defenses.

Just look at what pro-choice legal scholars say. Ruth Bader Ginsburg called the ruling "heavy-handed judicial activism." Laurence Tribe wrote "behind its own verbal smokescreen, the substantive judgment on which it rests is nowhere to be found." Former Harry Blackmun clerk Edward Lazarus wrote "[A]s a matter of constitutional interpretation, even most liberal jurisprudes — if you administer truth serum — will tell you it is basically indefensible."

FULL STORY