Rights and wrongs

是非曲直

It was hardly a surprise. The Supreme Court’s move to overturn Roe v Wade, the decision in 1973 that American women had a constitutional right to abortion, had been expected since a draft majority opinion was leaked in early May. And drama from the court was almost inevitable after Donald Trump seated three justices, giving it a 6-3 conservative supermajority instead of the 5-4 balance, with a swing vote in the middle, that had prevailed since the 1970s. Even so, when the ruling in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organisation came on June 24th, it was a shattering blow to those, like this newspaper, who believe in the right to abortion. Chief Justice John Roberts, who cautioned against a “dramatic step”, could not prevent the court from withdrawing a right that Americans had relied on for nearly half a century and which a majority of them have consistently supported.

【1】shattering 毀滅性的；令人驚駭?shù)?/p>

這并不令人意外。美國最高法院推翻1973年的羅伊訴韋德案，即美國婦女享有憲法賦予的墮胎權利。自5月初一份多數(shù)票意見草案被泄露以來，人們就預料到了這一裁決。在唐納德·特朗普任命了三名大法官后，保守派以6比3的絕對多數(shù)贏得了最高法院，而非處于上世紀70年代以來一直占主導地位的5比4的平衡，中間有一搖擺票的情況，最高法院發(fā)生的戲劇性事件幾乎不可避免。即便如此，當6月24日多布斯訴杰克遜女性健康組織案的判決出爐時，對于像本刊這樣相信墮胎權利的人來說，這是一個毀滅性的打擊。首席大法官約翰?羅伯茨曾警告稱不要采取“戲劇性的舉措”，但他無法阻止最高法院取消一項美國人依賴了近半個世紀、而且大多數(shù)美國人一直支持的權利。

The ruling is the most striking of the court’s decisions in its current term, but abortion is not the only area where it has radically tipped the scales. The justices have also loosened gun laws and eroded the separation of church and state (see United States section). If their final big verdict goes as expected, they are about to limit the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate emissions from power plants, undermining the Biden administration’s hopes of halving climate-changing carbon-dioxide emissions by 2030. Just 25% of Americans have confidence in the court, an all-time low, according to recent Gallup polling. That has not deterred the justices from embarking on a spree of judicial activism that will further deepen cracks in America.

【1】tip the scales 起決定性作用

這一裁決是最高法院當前任期內最引人注目的裁決，但墮胎并不是它完全起決定作用的唯一領域。法官們還放寬了槍支法，廢除了政教分離(見美國部分)。如果他們最終的重大裁決如預期的那樣，他們將限制美國環(huán)境保護局監(jiān)管發(fā)電廠排放的能力，從而破壞拜登政府在2030年前將氣候變化的二氧化碳排放量減半的希望。根據(jù)最近的蓋洛普民意調查，只有25%的美國人信任最高法院，這一比例創(chuàng)歷史新低。這并沒有阻止大法官們掀起一場司法激進主義的狂潮，而這將進一步加深美國的裂痕。

The impact of the abortion ruling is immediate and severe. The court has sent the matter back to the states, 13 of which have trigger laws that ban abortion or will do so soon. Women in conservative states have for years had to make long, costly journeys to find health care that in most of the rich world is available free and close to home. The sudden disappearance of abortion provision in more than a dozen states will cause the most harm among the poorest women, and those suffering complications in pregnancy (see International section). One consequence may be a further rise in America’s maternal-mortality rates, already the highest by far among rich countries.

墮胎裁決的影響是直接和嚴重的。最高法院已將墮胎裁決權歸還給各州，其中13個州已經(jīng)或即將啟動禁止墮胎的法律。多年來，保守州的女性不得不長途跋涉，花費高昂的費用，才能獲得在大多數(shù)發(fā)達國家免費且離家近的醫(yī)療服務。在十幾個州，墮胎條款的突然消失將對最貧窮的婦女和那些在懷孕期間出現(xiàn)并發(fā)癥的婦女造成最大的傷害。后果之一可能是美國的產(chǎn)婦死亡率進一步上升，目前美國的產(chǎn)婦死亡率已經(jīng)是發(fā)達國家中最高的。

It is true that Roe rested on shaky legal arguments. This left the right it sought to enshrine open to repeated legal attack by a highly motivated minority. The resulting fight has poisoned politics and dragged the court into the partisan mire. It has also now put other cherished rights at risk. The rulings that established the rights to contraception and same-sex marriage, for example, rest partly on the same interpretation of “due process” under the 14th Amendment that underpinned the right to abortion. In his opinion last week Clarence Thomas, the most conservative justice, made it clear that he believes these are ripe for reversal.

確實，Roe案的判決建立在不可靠的法律論據(jù)上。這使得它試圖保護的權利容易受到動機強烈的少數(shù)人的多次法律攻擊。由此引發(fā)的爭斗毒害了政治，并將法院拖入了黨派紛爭的泥潭。它現(xiàn)在也使其他寶貴的權利受到威脅。例如，保護避孕和同性婚姻權利的裁決，部分是基于支持墮胎權利的第14修正案對“正當程序”的相同解釋。上周，最保守的大法官克拉倫斯?托馬斯在他的觀點中明確表示，他認為現(xiàn)在是推翻這些規(guī)定的時機。

Thankfully, America is not about to ban gay sex or same-sex marriage. Too many voters would resist any such effort, and the court does not seem to have an appetite for it. Samuel Alito, the justice who wrote the opinion for the conservative majority overturning Roe, sought to throw cold water on the idea: “Nothing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion,” he wrote. Yet Justice Alito and Justice Thomas noted in 2020 that they would like to overturn the 2015 decision that established a constitutional right to same-sex marriage. Those rights no longer look quite so secure.

值得慶幸的是，美國并不打算禁止同性性行為或同性婚姻。抵制任何這樣的努力的選民太多了，而且法院似乎對此也沒有興趣。法官塞繆爾·阿利托為保守派多數(shù)派撰寫了推翻Roe案件的意見書，他試圖給這一想法潑冷水，他在意見書中寫道:“這份意見書中的任何內容都不應被理解為對與墮胎無關的先例提出質疑”。然而，阿利托法官和托馬斯法官在2020年指出，他們希望推翻2015年的決定，該決定確立了同性婚姻的憲法權利。這些權利看起來不再那么安全了。

The repercussions of the court’s activism will play out over years, and the response should be calibrated accordingly. The short-term priority for defenders of abortion rights must be to help women in states where it is now banned or hard to obtain. That means support for travel to states where abortion remains legal. It also means making sure women have ready access to a method of abortion that did not exist at the time of Roe: abortion medication, which allows women to end pregnancies at home safely up to 11 weeks. The Food and drug Administration has dropped a requirement that obliged a woman to collect one of the two drugs involved from a health-care provider. But it still imposes unnecessary rules on supply of the drugs. They should go. Better access to contraception, resisting conservative efforts to restrict funding for reproductive health, would help reduce demand for abortions in a country that has a high rate of unintended pregnancies compared with many others in the West.

【1】repercussion 間接后果

最高法院激進主義的影響將持續(xù)多年，其應對措施也應相應地進行調整。墮胎權利的捍衛(wèi)者短期內的優(yōu)先事項必須是幫助那些在禁止墮胎或很難獲得墮胎權利的州的婦女。這意味著要支持她們前往墮胎仍然合法的州。這還意味著要確保婦女能夠隨時獲得一種在Roe案時期不存在的墮胎方法，即墮胎藥物，該藥物允許懷孕11周內的女性在家安全終止妊娠。美國食品和藥物管理局已經(jīng)取消了一項規(guī)定，即女性必須從醫(yī)療服務提供者那里獲得兩種藥物中的一種(米非司酮，一種類固醇類的抗孕激素制劑)。但它仍然對藥物供應施加了不必要的規(guī)定(比如該藥品銷售必須通過經(jīng)過認證的藥房和經(jīng)過認證處方醫(yī)師)。他們應取消這樣的規(guī)定。與西方許多國家相比，這是在一個意外懷孕率較高的國家，在這樣的國家中，更好地獲得避孕藥具，抵制保守的“限制給生殖健康撥款“的行動，將有助于減少墮胎需求。

The Justice Department rightly plans to push back against states that try to prevent access to abortion medication. But however tempting it may be, the Biden administration cannot use its majority to force through new national rules by ending the filibuster in the Senate (which requires 60 of the 100 votes to pass most laws), because such a move itself lacks support. Packing an expanded court with liberal justices would be no way to settle complex arguments, and could rebound badly once political power changes hands.

【1】force through 強行通過；強制執(zhí)行

美國司法部計劃反擊那些試圖阻止獲得墮胎藥物的州，這是理所當然的。但是，無論它多么誘人，拜登政府都不能利用其多數(shù)席位結束參議院的阻撓議事(多數(shù)法律需要100票中的60票才能通過)來強行通過新的國家規(guī)則，因為這樣的舉動本身缺乏支持。用自由派法官擴容最高法院并不能解決復雜的爭論，而且一旦政權易手，可能會出現(xiàn)嚴重反彈。

In the medium term it would be nice to think that the justices, mindful of the court’s diminishing reputation, will start to exercise more self-restraint, including an embrace of term limits for themselves. Sadly, there is little sign that they will be in a mood for that. It will instead fall to voters to signal to conservatives that there are costs to running amok, and to influence the laws, state by state, that Better reflect what Americans really want on the thorniest issues such as abortion—which one side believes to be murder and the other a fundamental right for women. A polarised country seems poorly prepared for the sort of debate this requires. But it is what America needs, and in some of the more finely balanced states it is possible to imagine the re-emergence of the art of compromise.

【1】run amok ?person, animal? 橫沖直撞；?imagination? 極為活躍；?prices? 失去控制

從中期來看，考慮到最高法院聲譽的下降，法官們將開始更多地自我克制，包括對自己的任期加以限制，這是一件好事。但遺憾的是，幾乎沒有跡象表明他們想這么做。相反，選民需要向保守派發(fā)出信號，告訴他們橫沖直撞是要付出代價的，并會影響各州的法律，這些法律更好地反映了美國人在最棘手的問題上真正想要的東西，比如墮胎。一方認為墮胎是謀殺，另一方認為墮胎是婦女的基本權利。一個兩極分化的國家似乎對這種需要的辯論準備不足。但這正是美國所需要的，在一些更不偏不倚的州，可以想象妥協(xié)的技能會重新出現(xiàn)。

Never surrenderThat points to the longer-term solution, which is federal legislation to fill the vacuum that sucks in the justices. The conventional view is that this cannot happen, because of congressional gridlock. Yet that is not necessarily so, as the gun law just signed by President Joe Biden shows—the most significant gun-control legislation in nearly three decades, passed by the Senate on the day that the Supreme Court moved in the opposite direction on guns. With sufficient pressure from voters, even Congress could, eventually, stir itself into action.

這就指向了一個更長期的解決方案，即聯(lián)邦立法來擴大最高法院。傳統(tǒng)觀點認為，由于國會的僵局，這是不可能發(fā)生的。然而事實并非如此，正如喬·拜登總統(tǒng)剛剛簽署的槍支法所顯示的那樣，這是近三十年來最重要的槍支管制立法，在參議院通過的同一天，最高法院卻在槍支問題上采取了相反的行動。只要選民施加足夠的壓力，就連國會最終也會采取行動。