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10 J.L. & Biosciences 1 (2023)

handle is hein.journals/jlbsc10 and id is 1 raw text is: Journal of Law and the Biosciences, 1-73 https://doi.org/10.1093/jlb/sacO33 Original Article Why reason-based abortion bans are not a remedy against eugenics: an empirical study Sonia M. Suter *,t The George Washington University Law School, Washington, DC, USA *Corresponding author. E-mail: ssuter(alaw.gwu.edu ABSTRACT In Box v Planned Parenthood, Justice Thomas wrote an impassioned con- currence describing abortions based on sex, disability or race as a form of 'modern-day eugenics'. He defended the challenged Indiana reason-based abortion (RBA) ban as a necessary antidote to these practices. Inspired by this concurrence, legislatures have increasingly enacted similar bills and statutes allegedly as a prophylactic to 'eugenics', its underlying discrim- ination, and the racial disparities eugenics caused. This article tests my hypothesis that this legislative focus on eugenics is largely performative, rather than evidence of true concern about the discrimination and dispar- ities underlying eugenics. My research examined state laws in several areas that fall within narrow and broad understandings of eugenics to determine whether states with RBA bans have implemented policies to counteract eugenics more broadly. My analysis shows that they generally have not. Instead, the apparent motivation is to commandeer concerns about eugenics to restrict reproductive rights. This legislative mission is hypocritical, and it harms the very groups impacted by the eugenics movements-minorities, women, people with disabilities, the LGBTQ+ community, and immi- grants. Ultimately, it has led us to Dobbs, which makes everyone vulnera- ble to the eugenics policies Thomas condemns by undercutting previous constitutional protections against eugenics. t Professor of Law and Kahan Family Research Professor, Director of the Health Law Initiative, The George Washington University Law School. Many thanks to Paul Lombardo; Nicole Huberfeld; I. Glenn Cohen; Sarah Rispin Sedlak; Lewis Grossman; members of the Health Law Policy, Bioethics, and Biotechnology Workshop at Harvard Law School; participants of BioLawLapalooza 2022 at Stanford Law School; my fantastic and diligent research assistants, Robin Briendel, Nicolette DeLorenzo, Libbie Hamner, Deanna Hartog, Kelsey Kerr, Alexandra Marshall, Wisdom Onwuchekwa-Banogu, and Chelsea Sullivan; and my wonderful library liaison, Germaine Leahy. © The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Duke University School of Law, Harvard Law School, Oxford University Press, and Stanford Law School. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial-NoDerivs licence (https://creativecommons. org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial reproduction and distribution of the work, in any medium, provided the original work is not altered or transformed in anyway, and that the workproperly cited. For commercial re-use, please contact journals.permissions(aoup.com

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