Jim Obergefell and L.G.B.T.Q. groups warn that abortion ruling could impact other rights.
Advocates for L.G.B.T.Q. rights on Friday sounded the alarm over Justice Clarence Thomas’s concurring opinion overturning Roe v.
Wade, calling it a potential assault on the legal doctrine protecting a wide array of Americans’ civil rights. In his opinion, Justice Thomas argued that the court should reconsider and overturn cases guaranteeing the rights to same-sex marriage, same-sex consensual relations and contraception, saying the foundational legal theory on which they are based lacks constitutional grounding.
Justice Thomas said, however, that he agreed with the majority that the decision striking down Roe should not “cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.” Policy advocates and lawyers with some of the nation’s leading L.G.B.T.Q.
advocacy organizations expressed dismay and called his words a warning shot against any fundamental rights not explicitly enumerated in the Constitution, including protections for interracial marriage and how parents raise their children. “When one right is taken away, every other right we’ve come to rely on in this country is at risk.
