House Passes Bill to Protect Contraception Access

Bill comes after Justice Thomas called for the overturn of precedent protecting access to some birth control

The House of Representatives on July 21 passed legislation to protect access to contraceptives after Supreme Court (SCOTUS) Justice Clarence Thomas suggested that precedents guaranteeing contraceptive access as a right should be reconsidered.

The bill, called the “Right to Contraception Act,” passed in a 228-195 bipartisan vote.

Eight Republicans, including Reps. Liz Cheney (Wyo.), Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.), Anthony Gonzalez (Ohio), John Katko (N.Y.), Adam Kinzinger (Ill.), Nancy Mace (S.C.), Fred Upton (Mich.), and Maria Elvira Salazar (Fla.) joined all chamber Democrats in supporting the measure. An additional two Republicans, Reps. Bob Gibbs (R-Ohio) and Mike Kelly (R-Pa.), voted present.

Following the vote, Mace, who supported the bill, openly expressed her support for the measure, suggesting that she supported it because of restrictive abortion laws in South Carolina that do not consider exceptions to abortion access.

“My state is Banning EXCEPTIONS Protect CONTRACEPTION,” read writing over several strips of tape pasted to the back of Mace’s jacket.

The House move comes after SCOTUS in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruled that the power to regulate abortion—which had been substantially restricted in 1973’s Roe v. Wade—must be returned to state legislatures.

Roe v. Wade, like many other controversial SCOTUS opinions touching on loaded social issues, was based on the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee to substantive due process.

The court insisted in the majority opinion that other substantive due process cases—including Obergefell v. Hodges, which dictated that states must permit gay marriage, and Lawrence v. Texas, which barred states from criminalizing sodomy—were not under threat.

“Nothing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the majority opinion.

However, in a concurring opinion Justice Clarence Thomas, considered

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