"Even scholars who agree in principle with the outcome of Roe have criticized the Court’s blanket approach to creating a federally protected right to abortion. Justice Blackmun’s assumption that “the lack of consensus” about when life begins means that “abortion must be permitted,” rather than left to state legislatures, has been criticized as “arbitrary” and unwarranted. When Roe determined that states could not protect preborn humans as persons, “the Court effectively decided that the Constitution requires their exclusion.” Other commentators have contested the central holding of Roe but do not believe the Constitution justifies a blanket policy prohibiting abortion either. Some in this camp have argued that a Human Life Amendment to the Constitution is the best or only way to respond to Roe’s inadequacies.13 Some have advocated returning abortion policy to the states. The late Justice Antonin Scalia frequently noted his opposition to Roe and his belief that individual states should determine their abortion policy through democratic processes. In either case, if Roe’s critics are correct, constitutional scholars must revisit whether the Fourteenth Amendment protects prenatal life or whether each state may choose to permit abortion."
January 1, 1970