On June 24, 2022, in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Org., 2022 WL 2276808 (June 24, 2022), the U.S. Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade 410 U.S. 113 (1973) and Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey 505 U.S. 833 (1992) and held that (i) the U.S. Constitution does not confer a right to abortion and (ii) the authority to regulate abortion is held by the states. The statute at issue in Dobbs was Mississippi’s Gestational Age Act, which banned abortion after 15 weeks except in a medical emergency or in the case of severe fetal abnormality. Employers across the nation must now determine how to evaluate and respond to the far-reaching implications of this decision.

There Is Now No Constitutional Right To Abortion

Majority Opinion

A five-to-four majority of the Supreme Court concluded that there is no right to abortion under the U.S. Constitution and held that Roe and Casey must be overruled. To reach this result, the majority first determined that the due process clause of the 14th Amendment does not protect the right to an abortion, because such a right is not “deeply rooted in our history or tradition,” nor “essential to this Nation’s scheme of ordered liberty.” In support, the majority extensively reviewed the history of the laws prohibiting abortion and concluded that the Court in Roe had “ignored or misstated history.”

Next, the majority explained why it rejected the legal doctrine of stare decisis (a Latin term that means “to stand by things decided”)...

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