“The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
So the Ninth Amendment was NOT cited by the dissenters (Sotomayor, Kagan, Breyer) ANYWHERE! THAT is utter incompetence on their part, as far as I am concerned. Samuel Alito’s Opinion in DOBBS makes much of the fact that the US Supreme Court has, in years past, drawn a distinction between “rights” that are deemed “deeply rooted in our Nation’s history and tradition” and whether or not they are “fundamental to our 'scheme of ordered liberty,’" as opposed to those pesky “rights” that certain undesirables insist on asserting but which don’t, in fact, exist in Alito’s fevered brain. He is particularly critical of those who insist that the expansive “rights” of the Ninth Amendment are further reinforced by being incorporated by the post-Civil-War 14th Amendment, thus being applicable to the States.
For example, Alito says:
In interpreting what is meant by the Fourteenth Amendment’s reference to “liberty,” we [who?] must guard against the natural human tendency to confuse what that Amendment protects with our own ardent views about the liberty that Americans should enjoy. That is why the Court has long been “reluctant” to recognize rights that are not mentioned in the Constitution. Collins v. Harker Heights, 503 U.S. 115, 125 (1992). “Substantive due process has at times been a treacherous field for this Court,” Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U.S. 494, 503 (1977) (plurality opinion), and it has sometimes led the Court to usurp authority that the Constitution entrusts to the people’s elected representatives. See Regents of Univ. of Mich. v. Ewing, 474 U.S. 214, 225–226 (1985).
This recitation seems to refute the plain language of the 9th Amendment! AND, it appears to presume our ready “confusion” desperately in need of Justice Alito’s generous clarifications!
Practically speaking, the Supreme Court DOES have to go along with the actual language of the Constitution, but it’s a blatant violation of the justices' straightforward individual oaths to support the Constitution if they choose to ignore that plain language by using legislative approval (“the people’s elected representatives”) as a fabricated screen for enforcement of ALL our rights. The very existence of our RIGHTS should not EVER depend on our “elected representatives"! Who in the Hell do they think they are?
Ailto’s ludicrous Opinion draws on a lot of very ancient history, much of it written back when slavery was still legal, and on a lot of British theory, against whom we fought a Revolutionary War to escape their tyranny! Not only is Alito WRONG, he’s boring as Hell! Blahblahblah.
So, as far as I am concerned, the RIGHT to exclusively control our own bodies (male or female) and all parts thereof (including NON-viable fetuses—NOT merely “a woman’s right to choose") is STILL VALID, up until there is a fetal life that can exist on its own as a legal “person” separate from its mother (“viability”). Alito obviously takes great delight in disparaging the concept of fetal “viability” as a legal “fulcrum.” Sadly, but ONLY for the time being, our Supreme Court is not going to enforce those rights. But Alito and the rest of his thuggish “Gang of Six” cannot EVER take our rights away. And one day they will all be D-E-A-D! EVERY one of them!
Many may dismiss these opinions as those of a non-scholar of constitutional history. Howver, I can read plain English.
