Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf
Page Number: 166

Cite as:  597 U. S. ____ (2022) 

19 

BREYER, SOTOMAYOR, and KAGAN, JJ., dissenting 

with our law.”  Id., at 847.  Why?  Because the Court has 
“vindicated  [the]  principle”  over  and  over  that  (no  matter 
the sentiment in 1868) “there is a realm of personal liberty
which the government may not enter”—especially relating
to “bodily integrity” and “family life.”  Id., at 847, 849, 851. 
Casey  described  in  detail  the  Court’s  contraception  cases. 
See id., at 848–849, 851–853.  It noted decisions protecting
the  right  to  marry,  including  to  someone  of  another  race. 
See  id.,  at  847–848  (“[I]nterracial  marriage  was  illegal  in 
most States in the 19th century, but the Court was no doubt 
correct  in  finding  it  to  be  an  aspect  of  liberty  protected
against state interference”).  In reviewing decades and dec-
ades of constitutional law, Casey could draw but one conclu-
sion: Whatever was true in 1868, “[i]t is settled now, as it
was when the Court heard arguments in Roe v. Wade, that 
the Constitution places limits on a State’s right to interfere 
with  a  person’s  most  basic  decisions  about  family  and 
parenthood.”  Id., at 849. 

And that conclusion still held good, until the Court’s in-
tervention here.  It was settled at the time of Roe, settled at 
the time of Casey, and settled yesterday that the Constitu-
tion places limits on a State’s power to assert control over
an individual’s body and most personal decisionmaking.  A 
multitude of decisions supporting that principle led to Roe’s 
recognition and Casey’s reaffirmation of the right to choose; 
and Roe and Casey in turn supported additional protections
for intimate and familial relations.  The majority has em-

—————— 
time of the Fourteenth Amendment precludes its recognition as a consti-
tutional right?  Ante, at 33.  It has.  And indeed, it has given no other 
reason for overruling Roe and Casey.  Ante, at 15–16.  We are not min-
dreaders, but here is our best guess as to what the majority means.  It 
says next that “[a]bortion is nothing new.”  Ante, at 33.  So apparently, 
the Fourteenth Amendment might provide protection for things wholly
unknown  in  the  19th  century;  maybe  one  day  there  could  be  constitu-
tional protection for, oh, time travel.  But as to anything that was known 
back then (such as abortion or contraception), no such luck.