Frank's Musings

The Constitution was drafted and adopted when women were not considered equal to men or deserving of independent control of their physical or moral personhood

The world has changed since then and the Constitution has been modified to reflect those changes—sometimes by amendment, other times by reinterpretation in a Supreme Court decision.  Stare decisis has made those adaptations equivalent.

If the Court is sufficiently intransigent, as it may be with regard to its decision in Dobbs, there may be no possible alternative for opponents but (a) pass a new law to force states to legalize the abortion of non-viable fetuses, or (b) create a public outcry that will force a constitutional amendment in their favor.  

The filibuster in the Senate could obviate option (a) and option (b) requires a two-thirds majority in both Houses of Congress in order to be proposed to the states.  Therefore, it is reasonable to resort to a national electoral campaign in order to change the makeup of the Congress into two-thirds pro-choice. 

This has essentially been done in the past with regard to other civil rights short sightings of the Constitution.  The Amendment process was instituted because the framers of the document did not intend it to be a straight-jacket impervious to unanticipated changes in technology, medical and other science, culture and other aspects of society.  They did make that process difficult in order to prevent whimsical changes.  However, when an ideological Supreme Court majority decides to impose a dogmatic stricture on the nation, those procedural obstacles will eventually be surmounted. 

The framers probably did not anticipate the concentration of wealth that exists in today’s world and the possibility of using that wealth to achieve important political goals.  Few other issues are likely to receive the advocacy funding that committed backers of Choice should be able to raise.