"Measured by any logical test that we would wish to apply, the constitutional reasoning in the German Case is more tightly argued and more analytically precise than the argument advanced in Roe v. Wade. The German opinion is carefully crafted and composed in measured language, leaving little room for doubt or ambiguity with regard to its meaning. On the other hand, the privacy argument in Roe v. Wade is confusing and even contradictory. In the end, the American decision does not lend itself to a clear and unambiguous interpretation. Justice Douglas was even impelled to write a concurring opinion to hedge against a too narrow interpretation of the Court's opinion, studiously avoiding, for example, any reference to "potential life," a concept that Blackmun introduced as a limitation of privacy. Chief Justice Burger, on the other hand, concurred in what amounted to a near dissent by warning against a too broad interpretation of the opinion and by deploring Blackmun's use of current medical knowledge in support of the opinion. Of course, eroded logic is one of the costs of the high value that the justices as well as Americans generally place on the practice of individualized opinion writing on the Supreme Court. In Germany, such personalized expressions of opinion remain a clear exception to the rule. The law-certainly the highest law of the land-ideally speaks with one voice in Germany's legal culture, underscoring both the authority and the unity of the law."
January 1, 1970