Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf
Page Number: 79

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

71 

Opinion of the Court 

867.  That has not happened, and there is no reason to think 
that another decision sticking with Roe would achieve what 
Casey could not. 

The dissent, however, is undeterred.  It contends that the 
“very  controversy  surrounding  Roe  and  Casey”  is  an  im-
portant stare decisis consideration that requires upholding 
those precedents.  See post, at 55–57.  The dissent charac-
terizes Casey as a “precedent about precedent” that is per-
manently  shielded  from  further  evaluation  under  tradi-
tional stare decisis principles.  See post, at 57.  But as we 
have  explained,  Casey  broke  new  ground  when  it  treated 
the national controversy provoked  by Roe as a ground for 
refusing to reconsider that decision, and no subsequent case
has relied on that factor.  Our decision today simply applies 
longstanding stare decisis factors instead of applying a ver-
sion  of  the  doctrine  that  seems  to  apply  only  in  abortion 
cases. 

3 
Finally, the dissent suggests that our decision calls into 
question  Griswold,  Eisenstadt,  Lawrence,  and  Obergefell. 
Post, at 4–5, 26–27, n. 8.  But we have stated unequivocally 
that “[n]othing in this opinion should be understood to cast
doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.”  Supra, 
at 66.  We have also explained why that is so: rights regard-
ing  contraception  and  same-sex  relationships  are  inher-
ently different from the right to abortion because the latter
(as we have stressed) uniquely involves what Roe and Casey
termed “potential life.”  Roe, 410 U. S., at 150 (emphasis de-
leted); Casey, 505 U. S., at 852.  Therefore, a right to abor-
tion cannot be justified by a purported analogy to the rights 
recognized in those other cases or by “appeals to a broader 
right to autonomy.”  Supra, at 32.  It is hard to see how we 
could be clearer.  Moreover, even putting aside that these 
cases are distinguishable, there is a further point that the 
dissent ignores: Each precedent is subject to its own stare