It is comforting, but false, to assert, with Thomas Jefferson, that some ineffable, omniscient and omnipotent authority--Nature, God, Nature's God, whatever--has endowed all of humankind with certain "inalienable" rights. Strictly speaking, nothing in the universe, except entropy (i.e., disorder, deterioration and death), is inalienable. In fact, in the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson was writing high-falutin' humbug--intended, quite unabashedly, to justify revolution and political alienation from bonds connecting the colonies to Great Britain. To this end, Jefferson--magisterially but without evidence--proclaimed that the Universe itself had willed immutable and infinite rights--"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"--to our very mutable and very finite species.
But—and this is an important “but”—some rights DO, if accepted and sustained over appreciable periods of time, become so “deeply rooted” (a favorite notion among Supreme Court conservatives) that they are viewed by society as fundamental, necessary, and beneficial to the proper functioning of the commonwealth itself—i,e, as “constitutional.” Thus consecrated by "use" if not by the "universe", they come to be simply taken for granted as a part of the nation’s legal framework, as “settled law”—stare decisis. These long-internalized rights face little threat of being eliminated or changed for (Jefferson’s words) “light or transient causes.” Other rights, though—rights more recently accorded in response to changes within the society itself—and actually vital in present-day society—because their roots are not yet deep, because they are not yet simply taken for granted—such rights ARE indeed subject to alienation by powerful authorities not yet persuaded of these rights’ settled (i.e., “constitutional”) status.
Now, in the ongoing course of human events, it has become necessary for Americans to face the very real likelihood that one such recently-granted right—a woman’s personal control of her own reproductive processes—will be withdrawn by a SCOTUS so obsessed with deep roots that it is willing to ignore the value of the growing plant itself. Roe v. Wade is about to be overturned, and with it, the incipient constitutional right of a woman to control her own pregnancy.
I'm not sure that my term "incipient right” is quite appropriate. But TIME is the key factor here, isn't it? Though rights are never inalienable, as we have seen, they do become firmly "constitutional" OVER TIME. What SCOTUS is attempting to do, it seems, is "weed out" a growing plant that they themselves planted (with Roe v. Wade). They don't want to acknowledge that its root system is already firmly established; they don't want Americans to come to regard this plant as an essential element of our collective garden.
We must make them see that they are wrong!
Which means, I guess, that we all have more gardening work to do. Il faut cultiver notre jardin. This valuable right must be planted everywhere, nurtured everywhere, defended everywhere--from pests, predators, and stupid jurists, who--alas--don't seem capable of distinguishing a right from a rutabaga.
And we must persist—OVER TIME. Only thus, through our very human actions and interventions—and our persistence—will we ultimately ensure that this 'incipient' right to choose becomes, for all practical and conceivable purposes, inalienable within our constitutional framework. I know, I know: everyone is SO tired, and America’s women are so legitimately pissed off. SCOTUS itself is dishonoring the Constitution and breaking faith with its pledge to the American people. Sad, sad. But onward!
