CONLEY COMMENTARY (WSAU) – If a woman wishes to be a prostitute, who are we to tell her ‘no’? She’s making a decision to use her sexuality for profit. Isn’t that her business, not ours?
If a man wishes to inject himself with heroin, who are we to tell him ‘no’. He’s making a decision to numb his senses to the point of oblivion. Isn’t that his business, not ours?
That’s the road Planned Parenthood is leading us down with their petition to the state Supreme Court on abortion. If a woman wants to terminate her pregnancy, the rest of society should butt out.
The lawsuit hinges on a novel legal theory called body autonomy; that our bodies are ours to do as we wish. Only body autonomy is not a right in Wisconsin. Nowhere is it mentioned in our state constitution. There are indeed basic standards in society of what we can and can’t do with our bodies. Collectively we’ve decided that prostitution and drug use are out of bounds. It’s the same reason you or I can’t walk down the street naked. My nakedness certainly falls below community standards.
And Planned Parenthood asks the Supreme Court to make up a whole new category of rights. For nowhere in our constitution is the concept of body autonomy found. All the constitution says is that we have “inherent rights,” among them “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” There is no interpretation of that text that would include the right to an abortion. In fact, in 1849 Wisconsin’s legislature appeared to pass a ban on abortion. Last month a Dane County judge ruled that the law doesn’t say what it clearly does. She said that voluntary abortions are permissible; “fataside” is not. Her ruling is nonsense for people who realize that words mean what they say.
We have long suspected that the newly liberal state Supreme Court will see itself as a super-legislature, where liberals hope to accomplish things that the cannot through the regular lawmaking process.
The court is certain to rule in Planned Parenthood’s favor. And it should give the baby-killers a moment of pause. The next time conservatives have a majority on the court, this made-up right will be taken away. Is that the road we are on? Where rights are not universal constants, but appear and disappear after each election? And there will be untended consequences: prostitutes, drug users and nudists are waiting to use a body autonomy ruling. That genie will be hard to put back in the bottle.
Chris Conley
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