More Than A Magazine, A Movement
The Supreme Court has come down on the major abortion case Moyle v. United States, effectively dismissing the case and leaving pregnant women and healthcare providers in Idaho without answers.
I just had the privilege of experiencing the very best of American modern medicine this week for my knee surgery. We celebrate our American medical system as the best in the world—so why would we voluntarily decide to deny the care that I just received this past week to women in 21 states in our country?
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected a request from the Biden administration to send a dispute over emergency abortions in Texas back to the lower courts. The Court dealt with a set of similar cases out of Idaho in June without reaching a conclusive decision on the federal law in question, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA).
“Recently, the world has heard the story of Amber Thurman, a young woman who died because of Georgia’s extreme abortion ban,” said Noreen Farrell, executive director of Equal Rights Advocates. “Today’s punt by the Supreme Court will lead to more cases like Amber’s. … The Court is telling women in states with bans that need abortion care to save their life: ‘We don’t care.'”
Friday morning, the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that a law restricting firearms access for a narrow class of individuals subject to a specific kind of domestic violence restraining order does not violate the Second Amendment. The ruling is a “win” in much the same way the Court’s ruling in the mifepristone case FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine earlier this month is a win: The Court did the “bare minimum” necessary to cling to the last vestiges of its legitimacy.
The threat posed by violent abusers like Zackey Rahimi might be temporarily disarmed today, but the threat posed by the Supreme Court’s patriarchal agenda remains a loaded weapon.
The Biden administration’s 2023 judicial appointments were some of the most diverse in a presidential history, marking a historic win for representation in the courts.
The momentum continues in 2024.
Much of the criticism of Harvard’s Claudine Gay wasn’t about legitimate concerns about academic integrity or campus antisemitism. It was about who is in power.
But who’s surprised, really, that things went this way for Gay? Against Black women specifically, the conservative agenda is clear: Minimize their excellence and exaggerate their mistakes. Their identities and leadership become weaponized and politicized. There is no room for error.
Since 2021, the Senate has confirmed 140 lifetime judges. Two-thirds (94) are women, and more than 40 percent (60) are women of color, including Native American women. At the circuit court level, three-fourths of these confirmed judges are women, and more than half are women of color. (This stands in stark contrast to former President Trump’s appointees, including his nomination of zero Black judges, and just one Latina judge, to federal circuit courts.)
But this progress can’t stop here.
The professional and demographic diversity these judges bring to our federal courts matters. Our diverse nation needs judges who reflect and represent all of us. And we know this: Demographic and professional diversity on our courts has been shown to increase public trust in the judiciary and improve judicial decision-making.
Friday, June 30, marked the end of a roller coaster of a Supreme Court term. The same day, legal experts and commentators gathered for the 13th Annual Supreme Court Review at the University of California, Irvine.
The panel discussed the high Court’s bombshell rulings from the last several months, which put an end to affirmative action, protected businesses’ “constitutional” rights to discriminate against LGBTQ people under the guise of free speech, halted President Joe Biden’s authority to forgive federal student loans, and more. These monumental decisions will have ripple effects in the years and decades to come.
Watch the hour-long program, or read some of our favorite takes.
Colleges and universities can no longer take race into consideration as a basis for granting admission, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday, upending decades of its own precedents that have benefited Black, Latino and Indigenous students seeking higher education.
The long-awaited decision was met with instant rebuke from legal observers and civil rights advocates. “Today’s decisions from the Supreme Court on affirmative action represent a significant setback for civil rights in the U.S. and are a cornerstone of the conservative movement’s coordinated effort to roll back access to opportunity for systemically marginalized Americans,” said Kimberlé Crenshaw, executive director of the African American Policy Forum.
Women make up a little over a quarter of Congress and around one-third of state legislators. Policy can remedy inequities and create a world that is more supportive of women. When our government truly represents women, we won’t have to defend our right to exist in the halls of power, or our right to vote for the policy we need and deserve.
(This essay is part of The Majority Rules project—an artful essay and op-ed series from Ms. and Supermajority Education Fund.)
If 2022 proved anything, it’s that we must continue to organize and channel the collective rage that was triggered by the Court’s reversal of Roe, to not only restore abortion rights across the nation but to push forward toward our goal of full equality. There is no way the movement can be stopped.
It’s important to celebrate our wins and take stock of our losses at a time like this—because they are what will fuel us as we move forward into the new year and meet the new challenges it will bring.