2022.05.03 像多米诺骨牌一样倒下的柱子

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Alito’s Plan to Repeal the 20th Century
If the conservative justice’s draft opinion is adopted by the Court, key advances of the past hundred years could be rolled back.

By Adam Serwer
Illustration of columns falling like dominoes
Getty; The Atlantic
MAY 3, 2022
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About the author: Adam Serwer is a staff writer at The Atlantic.

If you are an American with a young daughter, she will grow up in a world without the right to choose when and where she gives birth, and in which nothing restrains a state from declaring her womb its property, with all the invasive authorities that implies.

That is the significance of the draft Supreme Court opinion leaked to Politico, which shows that the right-wing majority on the Court intends to discard Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, landmark precedents guaranteeing the constitutional right to abortion. The justices can change their minds before judgments are issued, but their opinions are drafted after they’ve taken an initial vote on the cases themselves. The draft likely reflects the direction of the final decision, even if the scope of that decision changes.

Mary Ziegler: The conservatives aren’t just ending Roe—they’re delighting in it

The draft, written by Justice Samuel Alito, is sweeping and radical. There is no need to dwell too long on its legal logic; there are no magic words that the authors of prior opinions might have used in their own decisions that could have preserved the right to an abortion in the face of a decisive right-wing majority on the Court. The opinion itself reads like a fancy press release from a particularly loyal member of the GOP Senate caucus. Alito’s writing reflects the current tone of right-wing discourse: grandiose and contemptuous, disingenuous and self-contradictory, with the necessary undertone of self-pity as justification. Alito, like the five other conservative justices, was placed on the Court by the conservative legal movement for the purpose of someday handing down this decision. These justices are doing what they were put there to do.

Alito claims to be sweeping away one of the great unjust Supreme Court precedents, such as Dred Scott v. Sanford, which held that Black people had no rights white men were bound to respect, or Plessy v. Ferguson, which upheld racial segregation. But in truth, Alito is employing the logic of Plessy, allowing the states to violate the individual rights of their residents in any way their legislatures deem “reasonable,” as the opinion in Plessy put it. Homer Plessy’s argument was that the segregation law violated his Fourteenth Amendment rights, and that those rights should not be subject to a popularity contest in every state in the union; what Alito describes as a “restrictive regime” of constitutional protection for abortion rights is the kind of safe harbor Plessy himself sought.

In Plessy, Justice Henry Billings Brown held that Louisiana’s segregation law, as far as the Fourteenth Amendment was concerned, “reduces itself to the question whether the statute of Louisiana is a reasonable regulation, and, with respect to this, there must necessarily be a large discretion on the part of the legislature.” Alito has now applied this same logic to abortion—but not just abortion—arguing that in the future, courts should defer to state legislatures “even when the laws at issue concern matters of great social significance and moral substance.” There’s no doubt that the Louisiana legislature felt the 1890 Separate Car Act was such an issue.

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“Plessy is, at its absolute core, a states’-rights case, in which the Court envisioned a notion of federalism so weak, so toothless, so bereft of substance that the federal government had no legitimate role in protecting Black people from states imposing racial segregation upon them,” Aderson Francois, a law professor at Georgetown University, told me. “This draft does the same thing: It envisions a notion of federalism so weak, so toothless, so bereft of substance that the federal government has no legitimate role in protecting women from states imposing forced births upon them.”

The implications of this ruling are therefore tremendous. Notwithstanding the reality that being a woman does not mean being pro-abortion-rights, all over the world the right to decide when and whether to give birth is tied to the political, social, and economic rights of women as individuals. That right is likely to be severely curtailed or to vanish entirely in at least 26 states if this decision takes effect. If the draft becomes the Court’s decision, however, it would have implications for more than just abortion. In the U.S., the rights of many marginalized groups are tied to the legal precedents established in the fight for abortion rights. This opinion, if adopted, provides a path to nullifying those rights one by one.

“The majority can believe that it’s only eviscerating a right to abortion in this draft,” Stephen Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin, told me, “but the means by which it does so would open the door to similar attacks on other unenumerated rights, both directly, by attacking the underpinnings of those doctrines, and indirectly, by setting a precedent for such an attack.”


Read: The future of abortion in a post-Roe America

Aside from rights specifically mentioned in the text of the Constitution, Alito argues, only those rights “deeply rooted in the nation’s history in tradition” deserve its protections. This is as arbitrary as it is lawless. Alito is saying there is no freedom from state coercion that conservatives cannot strip away if conservatives find that freedom personally distasteful. The rights of heterosexual married couples to obtain contraception, or of LGBTQ people to be free from discrimination, are obvious targets. But other rights that Americans now take for granted could easily be excluded by this capricious reasoning.

​

“In a series of cases beginning in the early 1920s, the Court carved out a protected space for family, marriage, and children that the government is constrained from regulating,” Kimberly Wehle wrote last December. “A rollback of Roe could split this sphere open if the conservative theory that implied rights are constitutionally invalid takes hold, and states begin passing draconian laws that creep into other areas of intimate personal life.”

The right-wing majority’s radical repurposing of the so-called shadow docket to set precedents and nullify constitutional rights rather than simply deal with time-sensitive matters foreshadowed this outcome. In the Court’s religious-freedom decisions related to the coronavirus pandemic, and in its choice last year to allow Texas to nullify the right to an abortion, you can see the outlines of this new legal regime: On the grounds that it constitutes a form of religious discrimination, conservatives will be able to claim an exemption from any generally applicable rule they do not wish to follow, while imposing their own religious and ideological views on those who do not share them. Although the right-wing justices present this rule in the language of constitutionalism, they are simply imposing their ideological and cultural preferences on the rest of the country. Roe itself left those opposed to abortion free not to have one; striking it down allows states to prevent those seeking abortions from obtaining them.


American life will now be guided by the arbitrary vicissitudes of conservative cultural identity, gleaned from Fox News, and by the justices’ inclination to shape their own views to conform to that identity. Aided by voting restrictions and partisan gerrymandering, the conservative movement will argue that its most coercive mandates have popular legitimacy, no matter how much of the country opposes them. If politicians are immune to popular majorities, they have no reason to heed them. But Republicans hardly need such advantages to prevail. One of the baffling mysteries of the past five years is why a movement so effective at the work of democracy is so dedicated to ending it.

An entire industry of commentators has tied its legitimacy to the Court, and they will obfuscate, semanticize, and quibble. These figures have long forestalled any backlash to the Court’s right-wing radicalism by muddying the waters about the significance of an appointment, a decision, a precedent. They have lied to the public, so that it does not realize what is being taken from it. In response to this decision, they will insist that the unprecedented leak is more important than the world the draft threatens to create. It is not.

Similarly, in his opinion, Alito writes that “we emphasize that our decision concerns the constitutional right to abortion and no other right,” and that “nothing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.” Give this statement the same weight that should have been given to Alito’s scolding of the press shortly after the Court’s shadow-docket decision on the Texas abortion ban, and his insistence that it had no bearing on Roe and did not nullify the right to an abortion in Texas. Alito’s word means absolutely nothing.


“This is total gaslighting; he knows as well as anyone that these other rights are like Roe, rooted in the right to privacy. If Roe is imperiled because it is unenumerated and not ‘rooted in our history and tradition,’ then these other rights are also subject to challenge,” Melissa Murray, a law professor at NYU, said of Alito’s disclaimer. “Conservative lawyers are going to eat this up like catnip, and of course they are going to challenge these other precedents.”

The conservative movement has been working toward this victory for decades, and it has been made possible not simply by its determination and a few fortunate accidents, but by the haplessness of its opponents. Many in the center of the Democratic Party have been paralyzed by the belief that they might “do popular stuff” and coast to victory without having to get their hands dirty fighting the opposition, while its left-wing critics too often forget that democracy is an ongoing process, not a battle that ceases after casting the right vote once or twice. In both cases, the right has been fortunate in having opponents who argue themselves into complacency.

The overturning of Roe will create a backlash, although not necessarily one that today’s Democrats will profit from, given their aversion to conflict. A movement will eventually emerge to oppose the criminalization of abortion and the despotisms this draft would create, and perhaps some of its leaders are alive today. Whoever they are, they will understand, just as the right-wing activists who worked decades for this moment do, that the freedoms enjoyed by one generation can be stripped away by another.

Adam Serwer is a staff writer at The Atlantic.



阿利托废除20世纪的计划
如果这位保守派大法官的意见草案被法院采纳，那么过去一百年来的关键进展可能会倒退。

作者：Adam Serwer
插图：像多米诺骨牌一样倒下的柱子
Getty; The Atlantic
2022年5月3日
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关于作者。亚当-瑟韦尔是《大西洋》杂志的一名职员作家。

如果你是一个有年幼女儿的美国人，她将在一个没有权利选择何时何地分娩的世界里长大，在这个世界里，没有任何东西可以限制国家宣布她的子宫为其财产，以及所有这意味着的侵略性权力。

这就是泄露给 "政治家 "的最高法院意见草案的意义，它表明法院的右翼多数派打算放弃罗伊诉韦德和计划生育诉凯西案，这些具有里程碑意义的先例保证了宪法规定的堕胎权。大法官们可以在发布判决前改变主意，但他们的意见是在对案件本身进行初步投票后起草的。草案可能反映了最终决定的方向，即使该决定的范围有所改变。

Mary Ziegler: 保守派不仅仅是在结束 "罗"，他们还在为之高兴

由大法官塞缪尔-阿利托撰写的草案是全面而激进的。没有必要在其法律逻辑上纠缠太久；没有什么神奇的词语是以前的意见的作者可能在他们自己的决定中使用的，可以在法院的决定性的右翼多数面前保留堕胎的权利。意见书本身读起来就像是共和党参议院党团中一个特别忠诚的成员的花哨的新闻稿。阿利托的写作反映了当前右翼话语的基调：宏大和蔑视，虚伪和自相矛盾，并带有必要的自怜的意味作为理由。阿利托和其他五位保守派大法官一样，是由保守派法律运动安排进法院的，目的是为了有朝一日做出这个裁决。这些大法官正在做他们被放在那里要做的事情。

阿利托声称要扫除最高法院的一个伟大的不公正的先例，如Dred Scott诉Sanford案，该案认为黑人没有白人必须尊重的权利，或Plessy诉Ferguson案，该案支持种族隔离。但事实上，阿利托采用的是普莱西案的逻辑，允许各州以其立法机构认为 "合理 "的任何方式侵犯其居民的个人权利，正如普莱西案的意见书所说。霍默-普莱西的论点是，种族隔离法侵犯了他的第十四条修正案的权利，这些权利不应该受制于联盟中每个州的人气竞赛；阿利托所描述的对堕胎权的宪法保护的 "限制性制度 "就是普莱西本人寻求的那种安全港湾。

在Plessy案中，Henry Billings Brown法官认为，就第十四修正案而言，路易斯安那州的种族隔离法 "将其本身简化为路易斯安那州的法规是否是合理的规定的问题，而且，关于这一点，立法机构必然有很大的自由裁量权"。阿利托现在将这一逻辑应用于堕胎--但不仅仅是堕胎--认为今后法院应尊重州立法机构，"即使在有争议的法律涉及重大社会意义和道德内容的情况下"。毫无疑问，路易斯安那州立法机构认为1890年的《分车法》就是这样一个问题。

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"乔治敦大学的法律教授阿德森-弗朗索瓦（Aderson Francois）告诉我："普莱西案的绝对核心是一个州的权利案，法院在其中设想了一个联邦制的概念，这个概念是如此软弱无力，没有牙齿，没有内容，以至于联邦政府在保护黑人免受各州种族隔离的影响方面没有合法作用。"这个草案做了同样的事情：它设想了一个联邦主义的概念，它是如此软弱，如此无力，如此缺乏实质内容，以至于联邦政府在保护妇女不受各州强迫生育的影响方面没有合法作用。"

因此，这项裁决的影响是巨大的。尽管作为一个女人并不意味着支持堕胎的权利，但在世界各地，决定何时和是否生育的权利与妇女作为个人的政治、社会和经济权利联系在一起。如果这一决定生效，这一权利可能会被严重削减，或者在至少26个州完全消失。然而，如果该草案成为法院的决定，它的影响将不仅仅是堕胎。在美国，许多边缘化群体的权利与争取堕胎权时建立的法律先例息息相关。这一意见如果被采纳，将提供一条使这些权利逐一失效的道路。

"德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的法学教授斯蒂芬-弗拉德克告诉我，"但它这样做的手段将为其他未列举的权利打开类似的攻击之门，既直接攻击这些理论的基础，又间接为这种攻击创造先例"。


阅读。后罗伊时代美国堕胎的未来

阿利托认为，除了宪法文本中特别提到的权利外，只有那些 "深深扎根于国家历史传统中 "的权利才值得宪法保护。这既是武断的，也是无法无天的。阿利托是说，如果保守派觉得这种自由个人不喜欢，就没有保守派不能剥夺的免受国家胁迫的自由。异性恋已婚夫妇获得避孕的权利，或LGBTQ人群免受歧视的权利，是明显的目标。但美国人现在认为理所当然的其他权利也很容易被这种反复无常的推理排除在外。



"在20世纪20年代初开始的一系列案件中，法院为家庭、婚姻和儿童划出了一个受保护的空间，政府被限制了对其进行管理，"Kimberly Wehle去年12月写道。"如果保守派认为隐含权利在宪法上是无效的理论占据上风，并且各州开始通过严厉的法律，悄悄进入个人私生活的其他领域，那么罗伊的倒退可能会使这个领域分裂开来。"

右翼多数派激进地重新利用所谓的 "影子案 "来设定先例和取消宪法权利，而不是简单地处理时间敏感的问题，这预示了这种结果。在法院与冠状病毒大流行有关的宗教自由裁决中，以及在其去年选择允许得克萨斯州取消堕胎权中，你可以看到这种新法律制度的轮廓。以构成一种宗教歧视为由，保守派将能够要求豁免任何他们不愿意遵守的普遍适用的规则，同时将他们自己的宗教和意识形态观点强加给那些不同意他们的人。尽管右翼大法官以宪政的语言介绍这一规则，但他们只是将自己的意识形态和文化偏好强加给国家的其他人。罗氏案本身让那些反对堕胎的人有不堕胎的自由；推翻罗氏案后，各州可以阻止那些寻求堕胎的人获得堕胎。


美国人的生活现在将由从福克斯新闻中收集到的保守派文化身份的任意变化来指导，并由大法官们倾向于塑造自己的观点以符合这种身份。在投票限制和党派划分的帮助下，保守派运动将争辩说，其最具强制性的任务具有大众的合法性，无论全国有多少人反对它们。如果政治家对民众的多数意见免疫，他们就没有理由听从这些意见。但是，共和党人几乎不需要这种优势就能获胜。过去五年令人费解的谜团之一是，为什么一个对民主工作如此有效的运动会如此致力于结束民主。

整个评论员行业都将其合法性与法院联系在一起，他们会混淆视听、语义化和争论不休。长期以来，这些人通过混淆一项任命、一项决定、一个先例的意义，阻止了对法院右翼激进主义的任何反击。他们对公众撒谎，使公众没有意识到他们正在被剥夺什么。为了回应这个决定，他们会坚持认为，这个前所未有的泄密事件比这个草案所威胁到的世界更重要。其实不然。

同样，阿利托在他的意见中写道："我们强调，我们的决定涉及宪法规定的堕胎权，而不是其他权利"，"本意见中的任何内容都不应该被理解为对不涉及堕胎的先例产生怀疑"。对这句话给予同样的重视，因为阿利托在法院对德克萨斯州的堕胎禁令作出影子案裁决后不久就对新闻界大加指责，并坚持认为这与罗伊没有关系，也没有使德克萨斯州的堕胎权失效。阿利托的话完全没有意义。


"这完全是气话；他和其他人一样清楚，这些其他权利就像罗伊一样，植根于隐私权。如果罗伊受到威胁是因为它没有被列举出来，而且不是'植根于我们的历史和传统'，那么这些其他权利也会受到挑战，"纽约大学的法律教授梅丽莎-默里在谈到阿利托的免责声明时说。"保守派律师会像吃猫粮一样吃这个，他们当然会挑战这些其他先例。"

几十年来，保守派运动一直在为取得这一胜利而努力，它之所以能够取得胜利，不仅仅是由于它的决心和一些幸运的意外，而是由于其对手的无能为力。民主党中央的许多人已经被这样的信念所麻痹，即他们可能 "做大众的事"，不用与反对派打交道就能取得胜利，而其左翼的批评者也常常忘记，民主是一个持续的过程，而不是在投了一两次正确的票后就停止了战斗。在这两种情况下，右派都很幸运，因为他们的对手把自己辩得很自满。

推翻罗氏案将引起反弹，尽管鉴于今天的民主党人对冲突的厌恶，他们不一定会从中获益。最终会出现一场运动，反对将堕胎定为刑事犯罪，反对这一草案将产生的专制，也许其中一些领导人今天还活着。不管他们是谁，他们会明白，就像那些为这一时刻努力了几十年的右翼活动家一样，一代人享受的自由可以被另一代人剥夺。

Adam Serwer是《大西洋》杂志的工作人员。