The abortion debate has been raging in the American discourse for the past couple days due to a draft majority opinion paper leaked from Justice Samuel Alito. His opinion is that Roe v. Wade went too far in its decision, and the right to individual autonomy is more limited than was previously debated.
“These attempts to justify abortion through appeals to a broader right to autonomy and to define one’s ‘concept of existence’ prove too much,” says the opinion.
Justice Alito believes this is a slippery slope into more and more rights that are considered an individual’s right to their own body. And one example he portrays is drug-use.
“Those criteria, at a high level of generality, could license fundamental rights to illicit drug use, prostitution, and the like.”
Marijuana Moment has spoken to a legal expert who specializes in drug policy about this issue, and the expert admits there has been some precedent for the issue. The argument has been made, that people have a fundamental right to use drugs, but he claims that these arguments haven’t been taken seriously outside of a medical context.
I wouldn’t worry that the Supreme court is coming for drugs next. People on both sides of the aisle are concerned about a decision leading to more and more repercussions based off of its reading (Democrats are concerned that this decision could mean that the Supreme Court will next target gay marriage) but abortion is such a politically hot topic that it exists inside its own debated bubble.
There is an irony to the idea that Republicans are the ones limiting the definition of individual autonomy, but that’s where we are in 2022.
Read the original article at Marijuana Moment.
