The so-called Texas abortion law has reached the Supreme Court for judgement. It seems to me basis of the suit by the Justice Department is attacking the law on the wrong basis. They that claim this law violates the decision of Roe vs. Wade that decreed it is unconstitutional to pass any law forbidding abortion in the first trimester.
This is not a law making abortion illegal, allowing the state to arrest and try a person under criminal law; it is more insidious than that. It creates a new category of civil law by which a person can sue another person when the plaintiff has not been damaged in any way by the action of the defendant.
Consider the First Amendment, that the government cannot pass a law to deny free speech. Under civil law, an individual may sue anyone who uses that right to libel or slander him, and collect monetary compensation for the harm done. However under tort law, the person claiming to have been injured must prove it and demonstrate with facts the monetary loss suffered. Now, thanks to Texas, there is a way around that.
The Texas law requires no such relationship between the action of the defendant and the legitimate connection to the plaintiff. Furthermore, there is no proof required as the amount of harm done, and there is no possible defense( even if her life was in danger) except that the defendant did not actually have an abortion,.
If this law is allowed to stand, I would like to use this new theory (that a plaintiff does not need to prove personal injury) to propose a new law that would allow anyone to sue any person or corporation that propagates “big lies.” Better yet, allow a class-action suit on behalf of all the citizens of this country. Then all the politicians and newscasters who claim that ex-President Trump won the election would be forced to pay damages if they could not prove it was true.
There would be no end to the possibilities to set one person against another for no reason except that one is offended by the conduct of the other, It could be called “Mind your neighbor’s business” law, and it would upset the whole concept of justice and make law even more of an “a**” (Charles Dickens) than it already is.
I have realized, since the Supreme Court allowed the military draft during the Vietnam War, in spite of the constitutional amendment forbidding involuntary servitude, that there is no such thing as settled law or inalienable, constitutional rights. Which rights will be upheld is up to the whim of a few individuals. But without settled law, there is no stability and no justice.
Judith Truesdell lives in Shelburne.