Minors can receive contraception confidentially under Title X in the state with the highest repeat teen birth rate

Minors can receive contraception confidentially under Title X in the state with the highest repeat teen birth rate

Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general, has sued the Biden administration over a longstanding federal program that provides teenagers access to contraception without parental consent, the state’s latest attack against the federal government’s reproductive healthcare policies.

“This suit is likely a preview of where the Texas GOP – and national Republicans – stand on attacking contraception access,” says Mary Ziegler, a professor at University of California, Davis, School of Law and reproductive health expert. “While Republicans say they don’t want to take aim at contraception, this is another sign that this is actually where we’re headed.”

Title X, created in 1970, offers comprehensive family planning and preventive health care services for low-income and uninsured residents. Texas is among a handful of states that require parental consent before a teenager can get birth control – but Title X-funded contraception was the exception. Under the program, minors can receive contraception confidentially.

Texas has the highest repeat teen birth rate and one of strictest abortion bans in the US.

  • theneverfox@pawb.social
    1·
    3 months ago

    That doesn’t fix the problem though - the legal system is extremely messy. It changes over time and rulings can be flat wrong, or the decision can be undercut by a legal argument coming at it from another direction

    For example, citizens United changed campaign finance laws by reclassifying it under the first amendment. That decision means that any law limiting the ability for corporations to campaign for a candidate violates the first amendment, and could be struck down as unconstitutional. It was a bad decision, but congress doesn’t have the authority to override it (by design)

    The supreme Court shouldn’t be writing things in stone - that’s congress’s job. The court is responsible for handling conflicts between laws, and the law changes over time. Their decisions are also contextual - they’re based on the legal arguments presented in each case, so instead of repealing Roe they could’ve instead ruled that the state can forbid doctors from performing abortion without contradicting the previous decision

    The fact that they’re overstepping and using this role to legislate is an entirely different issue - they have way too much individual power and almost no oversight. Their decisions need to be challenged more, not less