Reconceptualized Majority Opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States of America, Skinner v. Oklahoma
Editors
Kimberly M. Mutcherson
Files
Description
No volume on reproductive justice could be complete without addressing the seminal case of Skinner v. Oklahoma. Skinner is the first Supreme Court decision to subject a law limiting reproduction to stringent scrutiny, and it achieves this result by entwining constitutional protection of reproductive liberty with equality. Unlike the reproductive rights framework, which focuses upon the individual’s right to make reproductive choices free from government regulation, reproductive justice emphasizes the political context within which race, gender, class, and other identities intersect to result in reproductive oppression. Skinner foreshadows this broader analysis, by striking down a state sterilization statute not because it interfered with individual liberty but based upon the recognition that governmental power to draw lines regarding who could reproduce and who could not posed the threat of “invidious discriminations … against groups or types of individuals” in violation of the constitutional guarantee of equality.
ISBN
9781108348409
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108348409
Publication Date
3-2020
Book Title
Feminist Judgments: Reproductive Justice Rewritten
First Page
36
Last Page
52
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Series
Feminist Judgment Series: Rewritten Judicial Opinions
Keywords
reproductive justice, law and gender, health law and policy
Disciplines
Health Law and Policy | Law | Law and Gender | Sexuality and the Law
Recommended Citation
Williams, Thomas, "Reconceptualized Majority Opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States of America, Skinner v. Oklahoma" (2020). Contributions to Books. 334.
https://digitalcommons.wcl.american.edu/facsch_bk_contributions/334