Unwanted Pregnancy, Due Process of Law and Justice White

In Thornburgh et al. v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, et al. (dissenting opinion), 476 U.S. 809 (1986), United States Supreme Court Justice Byron White argued that a state's interest in the life of a fetus justifies "the infliction of some degree of risk of physical harm" on the pregnant woman exercising her constitutionally-based liberty to abort. The position of this article is that the adoption of Justice White's premises would curtail extensively due process rights for this woman. Such curtailment would tend to victimize her and also presume that she has committed a public offense, i.e., to criminalize her body. There is reason to believe Justice White's position may become the law of the land. The author concludes that differentiation in constitutional law of a woman's body by pregnant and not pregnant will be costly

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