A coalition of nearly 40 national pro-life leaders sent a letter to the chairs of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Monday specifying the radical pro-abortion record of Biden Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson.
Led by the Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List), the coalition’s letter was addressed to the committee’s chairman, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), and ranking member Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) as confirmation hearings began for Jackson, who was chosen by Biden following the announcement of his commitment to nominate a black woman to the nation’s highest court.
The letter explains how the Supreme Court’s 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade has been harmful to the fabric of the country;
One of the destructive outcomes of the Roe decision was removing policymaking decisions from elected representatives. Judicial activism promotes and extends this blatant overstepping of separation of powers. Especially now, as the Supreme Court considers a case that questions Roe’s core holding, confirming a justice to the Supreme Court with a commitment to judicial activism would be a step in the wrong direction.
On Tuesday, during an exchange with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) on the issue of abortion and the cases of Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, Jackson responded:
Roe and Casey are the settled law of the Supreme Court concerning the right to terminate a woman’s pregnancy. They have established a framework that the Court has reaffirmed and, in order to revisit … the Supreme Court looks at various factors because stare decisis is a very important principle.
Jackson added:
[A]ll Supreme Court cases are precedential. They’re binding and their principles and their rulings have to be followed. Roe and Casey, as you say, have been reaffirmed by the Court and have been relied upon, and reliance is one of the factors that the Court considers when it seeks to revisit or when it’s asked to revisit … a precedent. And, in all cases, those precedents of the Supreme Court would have to be reviewed pursuant to those factors because stare decisis is very important.
The letter signed by the pro-life leaders details some of Jackson’s prior work:
Jackson’s past writings strongly indicate that she may be unable to fairly consider arguments from those politically divergent from her own. In an amicus brief co-authored by Jackson on behalf of the Massachusetts National Abortion Rights Action League (Mass. NARAL) and other abortion groups regarding buffer zones around abortion clinics in Massachusetts, she portrayed pro-life sidewalk counselors as a “hostile, noisy crowd of ‘in-your-face’ protesters.” However, offering life-affirming support or prayer outside of a clinic is not “harassment” and to insist that offering an alternative to abortion is “indisputably harmful to a medical patient’s physical well-being” is the height of absurdity.
SBA List President Marjorie Dannenfelser said the fact that the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, a challenge to Mississippi’s ban on abortions after the 15th week of pregnancy, is expected this summer, “the stakes have never been higher in the fight to restore power to protect unborn life to the people and their elected representatives, not unelected judges.”
“Ketanji Brown Jackson’s record of hostility to pro-life Americans is radically out of step with the majority of the country,” Dannenfelser added. “Her nomination fulfills Joe Biden’s promise to only appoint justices who support the Roe v. Wade regime and his party’s broader agenda of abortion on demand up to birth, without limits of any kind.”
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Susan Berry, PhD, is national education editor at The Star News Network. Email tips to [email protected].
