WASHINGTON
The Supreme Court said Monday it would hear a major challenge to the reach of the landmark Roe vs. Wade abortion ruling and decide whether states may bar nearly all abortions after 15 weeks of a pregnancy.
The justices said they had voted to hear an appeal from Mississippi that urges the court to “reconsider the bright-line viability rule” that says states may not prohibit abortions until the time a fetus is viable or capable of living on its own. This is generally about the 23rd week of a pregnancy.
It is the court’s first major move to reconsider abortion rights since Justice Amy Coney Barrett replaced Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died in September shortly after Mississippi had lodged its appeal. Barrett, who has acknowledged being personally opposed to abortion, is widely expected to be the vote that would allow the court’s conservative majority to rein in abortion rights.
On Monday, the Supreme Court finally announced it would hear a case on Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban, a rule that directly challenges Roe v. Wade’s mandate that states cannot ban abortion before a fetus is viable. If Mississippi’s 2018 ban is upheld by the now-staunchly conservative court, it would not only further restrict access to abortions in a state where access is already severely limited, it would also open the door to more and more restrictive bans that up to now have been determined to be unconstitutional.
The case will be the first major abortion dispute to test all three of former President Donald Trump s appointees to the top court, including its newest member, Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
The top court announced in an order that it will hear the dispute, Dobbs vs. Jackson Women s Health Organization, 19-1392. The court will hear the case in its term beginning in October and a decision is likely to come by June 2022.
The case concerns a Mississippi abortion law passed in 2018 that bars abortions after 15 weeks with limited exceptions. The law was blocked by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Under existing Supreme Court precedent, states may not ban abortions that occur prior to fetal viability, generally around 22 weeks or later.