The US Supreme Court – The Bastion of Private Prejudice

The clash between religious patriarchy and women’s rights to equality and to control over their bodies has reached new heights. The American Supreme Court has played a pivotal role in this battle, transforming into a bastion of private prejudice. In its rulings the Court has repeatedly narrowed women’s reproductive rights, while granting private citizens the power to enforce their prejudices to restrict women’s choices. This trend, that has started and expanded through the Hobby Lobby line of cases, has recently culminated in the Texan Whole Women’s Health v. Jackson case. In this case the Court has taken an unprecedented further step in the transfer of the power to control women’s bodies into the hands of private third parties, by effectively approving the reinstitution of the notorious bounty system as a means of preventing women from exercising their right to have an abortion. I will discuss the implications of these developments for women’s rights and for the rule of law in the US