Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., who wrote the draft opinion for the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, said in it that nothing in the text of the Constitution supports a right to abortion and that the authority to regulate abortion belonged to the states.
He wrote that Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which reaffirmed Roe in 1992, “short-circuited democracy.”
In the draft, he cited the history of punishing “abortionists” in the United States, and said there was evidence that the laws enacted against abortion were “spurred by a sincere belief that abortion kills a human being.”
Here are five key passages from his drafted argument, which could change before official publication.