What the Opinion overruling Roe v. Wade Reveals about the Character of the Right-Wing Justices

The opinion signed by a majority of Supreme Court justices in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization provides a window through which to view their psychic states. One can imagine honorable justices reaching a decision, which, though just, would work hardship on many people affected by it. Justices of this kind would express regret and explain how the decision was compelled by the law, perhaps recommending that the hardship could be minimized or removed by remedial legislation. The five justices signing the opinion in Dobbs are not honorable. This is evident not because the decision in Dobbs was egregiously wrong, which it was, but because, as Jennifer Rubin noted in a Washington Post column yesterday, the “opinion overturning the right to abortion drips with disdain for women’s concerns about personal autonomy and for the principle of stare decisis.”