Dobbs, History and Tradition, and Substantive Due Process

Abstract

Another problematic aspect of the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson has to do with the legal principle of substantive due process, deriving from the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. This article provided an in-depth examination of the principle of due process, and demonstrates how the Court’s decision in Dobbs winds up restricting that principle, and thus may not provide the strongest legal ground on which to restrict abortion. Instead, the article concluded that interpreting the due process clause according to its original public meaning would resolve a number of the problems associated with the substantive due process doctrine, affecting other matters beyond that of abortion.