Abstract
Paulsen reflects on abortion as an instrument of eugenics in the US. He comments that Professor Melissa Murray is right about one thing. Laws banning trait-selection abortion--prohibitions on abortion when had solely because of the race, sex, or specific disability of the child that otherwise would be born--pose a direct challenge to the Supreme Court's constitutional abortion-law doctrine under Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Such laws prohibit abortion based on a specific reason for having an abortion. And under current judicial doctrine, the state can't do that: Roe and Casey held that a pregnant woman has a constitutional right to obtain an abortion; that that right may be exercised for essentially whatever reason the woman sees fit; and that the state may not make or enforce laws that have the purpose or effect of inhibiting the woman's abortion choice.