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The Supreme Court overturned its 50-year-old Roe v. Wade decision last Friday, which means that women have lost their federal constitutional right to an abortion. This also means that each state now holds the power to decide abortion rights – they can either outlaw or ban or introduce new restrictions to regulate the procedure. Read more about it here and here.

But that’s not all. Contraception, same-sex relationships, and same-sex marriage could be next as Justice Clarence Thomas suggest Supreme Court should “reconsider” the decisions to these landmark rulings as well. He said, “In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell.”

Thomas added, “Because any substantive due process decision is ‘demonstrably erroneous’ … we have a duty to ‘correct the error’ established in those precedents.”

Clarence Thomas, an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, is currently the longest-serving member having sat on the Supreme Court for more than thirty years since he was appointed in 1991 by then-President George H.W. Bush.

Obergefell refers to Obergefell v. Hodges, a 5-4 majority landmark ruling wherein the U.S. Supreme Court declared on 26 June 2015 that “the U.S. Constitution protects same-sex couples’ freedom to marry in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. territories.”

Meanwhile, “Lawrence” refers to the Supreme Court 2003 ruling on Lawrence v. Texas that made same-sex sexual activity legal not only in every State but also in all of the United States territories.

In an interview with The Independent, Jim Obergefell said that “he was terrified and people should be terrified,” regarding Thomas’ suggestion for the Supreme Court to review the aforementioned landmark cases.

“This is a signal to people who are opposed to marriage equality, who are opposed to LGBT+ equality, who are opposed to progress, giving them actual words that they can use in a lawsuit to challenge something.” Obergefell added, “And it’s a signal to judges in state and federal courts that if cases come before you using this argument, the Supreme Court might be on your side.”

Obergefell is the American civil rights activist who was the lead plaintiff in Obergefell v. Hodges. Tomorrow, June 26, 2022, marks the 7th anniversary of the legalization of same-sex marriage in the USA.

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