'Women are not some piece of collectively owned community property'

[Jrose]

Last edited Mon Sep 30, 2024, 06:41 PM - Edit history (1)

Some key quotes from the order in which Judge Robert McBurney struck down Georgia’s extremely restrictive abortion ban:

"Women are not some piece of collectively owned community property the disposition of which is decided by majority vote.

…..the liberty of privacy means that they alone should choose whether they serve as human incubators for the five months leading up to viability. It is not for a legislator, a judge, or a Commander from The Handmaid’s Tale to tell these women what to do with their bodies during this period when the fetus cannot survive outside the womb any more so than society could -- or should -- force them to serve as a human tissue bank or to give up a kidney for the benefit of another.

…liberty in Georgia includes in its meaning, in its protections, and in its bundle of rights the power of a woman to control her own body, to decide what happens to it and in it, and to reject state interference with her healthcare choices."

(Reported by Chris Stein, The Guardian)

[Ocelot II]

1. Link to the order:

https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/25178647/georgia-abortion-law-ruling-sept-30-2024.pdf

McBurney is also the presiding judge in the Fulton County case against Trump.

[Jrose]

24. Thanks, Ocelot II for the link. I was having technical problems with that!

[littlemissmartypants]

33. Yes! Thank you! ❤️

[Sogo]

38. Whatever has happened to the Fulton County case?

[UpInArms]

42. 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

That was one of the most beautifully written Court Decisions I have ever read. (I have read hundreds, if not thousands, in my lifetime.)

[liberalmuse]

2. This is awesome.

Finally, a judge laying it all out. What a hero. And saying that, it’s sad that people who recognize basic human rights could be considered hero’s in the 21st fucking century.

[Timeflyer]

3. This is so great!

[DET]

4. Wow!

That took some courage. Now come the death threats. The judge really has a way with words.

[efhmc]

6. I always wonder how any normal person does that.

[Tweedy]

9. The judge has a way with understanding

the right to bodily autonomy.

I really want to see what would happen if we forced right wing judges to simply donate blood once a month. Since they mostly could not be bothered to wear a mask to not kill their neighbor, I have little doubt blood donation would be a horrible ordeal for all of them.

[electric_blue68]

21. No kidding! ☹️ For those of us who practice "woo" white light this good judge, his workplace, home, and family.

[efhmc]

5. Excellent quote.

[Tweedy]

7. Finally! A jurist who understands autonomy and the right to privacy

This judge just made my day.

It was beginning to concern me that right wing judges were nonchalantly turning living breathing female folks into chattel simply because of our reproductive organs and no-one responded that hey, women are not property !!

[Jrose]

34. I hope many of us in this country will remember 2024 as the turning point

when the looming threat of dictatorial terror by a cult of madmen...was crushed by the rise of courageous women and men who respected them.

[ms liberty]

8. So well said. Can we replace one of our current SC Justices with this person?

Please?

[cpamomfromtexas]

50. I think he just interviewed for the job

Kamala will nominate him. I would bet on it.

[AmBlue]

10. Oh hell yeah

Awesome explainer. But it baffles me that this needs to be explained at all. Just mind-numbingly crazy that we are here.

[dickthegrouch]

48. The 19th amendment was necessary!

[WhiskeyGrinder]

11. "during this period when the fetus cannot survive outside the womb" Okay, so what happens at "viability"?

Is a right with a deadline truly a right?

[Ocelot II]

14. It's basically the same result as Roe v. Wade.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

15. Which is why I say that Roe is the floor and we have to do better with whatever comes next.

[LearnedHand]

20. Totally agree

Especially that "Roe was the floor."

[Joinfortmill]

28. At that point I think it becomes a medical decision with a physician.

[Tweedy]

22. Yes.

Viability means the fetus can survive outside the womb.

This is Roe v. Wade language.

Our founders would have allowed abortion later, though. They believed abortion was allowed until quickening, which happens when the fetus moves.

The so-called originalists on our Supreme Court ignored our founders entirely. Instead our “honorable” originalists reached way back to the Long Parliament to quote a religious zealot who burned “heretics” for a living.

In a not so strange twist, the same “originalist” justices of our Supreme Court ignored the England’s Long Parliament to grant Mr. Trump immunity for his multitudinous law-breaking.

Oliver Cromwell and the Long Parliament disagreed vehemently with that immunity decision. How could I possibly know that? They cut off Charles II’s head for his many crimes against them.

The Supreme Court originalists are picky about their legal theories. They begin with their desired outcome and then hunt for their authority.

[lonely bird]

44. Agreed

Especially since “originalism” is a relatively recent phenomenon pushed by Bork among others.

Jefferson said that expecting a constitution to not consider the times would be like expecting a man to wear the same jacket that fit him as a boy.

Originalism is bullshit.

[Tweedy]

53. Absolute bs

Robert Bork wanted to rationalize his decision to fire Archibald Cox.

We are living in Robert Bork’s guilt ridden ruined brain pan. The Supreme Court just rounded the circle by reversing the unanimous Nixon v. U.S. without having the guts to actually do so.

Robert Bork was a brilliant man who was so subservient to Richard Nixon he truly did forget he was an American man.

[VMA131Marine]

35. If the fetus is viable then it's called a birth

The baby can survive outside the uterus so there’s no reason not to choose that.
Most if not all late term abortions are due to some abnormality in the baby that is incompatible with life.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

37. .

The baby can survive outside the uterus so there’s no reason not to choose that.

If there's no reason to "choose that," we don't need a law preventing it. Defining a situation that requires exceptions only creates barriers.

[samnsara]

43. when i offered to take a friend to get a abortion in the 70s...

..there needed to be an ultra sound to determine if she was over 5 mos.

[Seinan Sensei]

12. Can we charge Rethug politicians with practicing medicine without a license?

[Demovictory9]

13. Yes!!!

[senseandsensibility]

16. Finally someone put into words

what I've been feeling. K and R.

[rubbersole]

17. "Oh, noes!!!

A commie judge takin' away our incubators! Just when I was going through my stepdaughters junior high school yearbook pickin' out my perfect baby mama"...said the captain of the Georgia proud boys in mtg's district.

[flashman13]

18. I think that when President Harris is looking for candidates to fill new SCOTUS positions,

McBurney needs to be on the short list. He is a jurist - not a witch burner (I'm talking to you Sam).

[littlemissmartypants]

19. Why didn't you post the link?

[Jrose]

25. Sorry, was having tech glitches! 'Ocelot II' did thankfully post the link.

[Joinfortmill]

30. No need to apologize. Appreciate the post.

[littlemissmartypants]

32. Oh, no. Technical glitches are no fun. I hope you can get them ironed out. ❤️

[AKwannabe]

23. ....

Handmaidens Tale Commander! Ha!

This is awesome!

[GB_RN]

26. Finally.

A judge who follows the Constitution (and the state’s), science and common sense, instead of an ideology rooted in oppression.

[Joinfortmill]

27. Wow. Right on!

[Clouds Passing]

29. WE ARE NOT GOING BACK, PERIOD.

[slightlv]

31. Finally, a freaking judge who "gets it!"

this results in different meanings being prescribed to the same words, phrases, and provisions as different minds and sensibilities take their turn discerning that meaning. In other words, the meaning of the Constitution is no more fixed than is the composition of the majority in the highest courts of the land -- especially when formerly bedrock principles such as stare decisis appear to be on the wane.

I really like the way he brought in what has been happening in SCOTUS and other courts today. There is so much in this order that makes common sense of issues that the forced birth people have muddied with their words and religious ideas. That is one area I didn't see the judge address, and I do ding him for that. He even quotes the bible passage that the forced birthers used to justify the Act, but doesn't mention anything about the separation of church and state.

But that is really the only "ding" I can see in this. His language is clear, the footnotes, especially, are extremely valuable. In considering the equal protection clause, I hadn't thought of pregnant vs non-pregnant women as the two classes due equal protection. I'd always just reverted to the male vs female classes, and wondered how you could consider equal protection between those two classes, when men cannot give birth.

Oh, that we would have more judges on the bench like this one! This is a carefully considered judgement, easy to read, and wise in the way Reality actually works. Not according to some Sky God, but according to the state's constitutions and its versions. How so much better a reading than Sam Alito's denial of our rights based on a 16th century witch hunting monk. I think Alito could take some remedial classes from this judge! And to think, this judge is MALE.

[GopherGal]

49. There's a cartoon going around

with a person peeking into a baby carriage and asking "Is it a boy? Or property of the state?"

That prompted me to think - presuming the state* does have an interest in reproductive activities, at what age do they take ownership of little girls? Immediately at birth? (since baby girls have all the eggs they will ever have when they're at about 20 wks gestation in their mothers' wombs) Or is it just when a girl has her first period? (and is, presumably, capable of bearing children). Or is it when she becomes sexually active? (and therefore a potential forced incubator.)

* "the state" seems to mean "our society" to some and "the economy" to others. Even taking it to mean "our society" (the more Democratic viewpoint, I believe), does not mean society's interest overrides the individual's rights. I find the "forced kidney donation" example from the opinion to be an interesting gender-neutral example here.

[slightlv]

51. The forced kidney donation example

harks back to when we were arguing about this in the early days -- that corpses have more rights now than living, breathing women. You cannot take organs from a corpse or do anything to the corpse, unless paperwork has been filed prior to death. Women... not so much any more.

[liberalla]

36. Wow, I'm so happy with this order and this judge! ...the robustness and strong defense against the abortion ban.

Thank you Judge McBurney!

[dlk]

39. At last!

A reasoned judge who lives in this century and doesn’t view women as glorified chattel. This post made my day!

I know there are others. However, Judge McBurney’s choice of language was especially meaningful.

[Native]

40. Wow. Just wow.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

41. National Socialist Vance believes in the collectivization of white baby production. Production, not support

magas are forever claiming that Democrats are nazis because they are socialist which is supposedly the guiding principle of the National Socialist Party (of 1930s Germany and beyond). "socialist", hence equivalent to communist which is a word they use interchangeably as if it were a synonym.

magas and Cons like Vance want to increase white baby production to counteract the Great Replacement they fear is being accomplished by immigration; hence "Take back my country!".

Of course, Cons and magas never support pre-natal care, nor early childhood care. That costs money. They only support births and manufactured "rights" of embryos and fetuses, especially white ones.

[malaise]

45. Robert McBurney For the Supreme Court

Rec

[wackadoo wabbit]

46. This is beautiful ... n/t

[Betty Boom]

47. Wow. Beautifully said.

Brought me to tears.

[Morbius]

52. Not a Republican, I'm guessing.

Man makes sense. Federalist Society wouldn't like him.