[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 1]
[Senate]
[Pages 571-572]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                43RD ANNIVERSARY OF ROE V. WADE DECISION

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I come to the floor on two issues of 
great importance to our Nation, both involving the rights and 
opportunities of individuals to live in the greatest, strongest Nation 
in the history of the world, with the tremendous opportunity to fulfill 
their dreams and their rights--rights to enhance themselves and rights 
of privacy.
  Tomorrow we will celebrate the 43rd anniversary of the Supreme Court 
decision Roe v. Wade. As I recall well from my days as a law clerk to 
Justice Blackmun in the term following Roe v. Wade, that was a bitterly 
controversial decision, but it was one that we thought at the time 
would assure every woman of her constitutional right to make her own 
decision about whether and when to have a child, based on the 
fundamental right of privacy that decision enshrined and expressed and 
protected.
  Unfortunately, those great hopes have been dashed. Over the last four 
decades, this constitutional right to reproductive care has been under 
attack throughout this country. Rather than advancing the health and 
well-being of women, legislators in a lot of States, and even in the 
Federal Government,

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have put themselves squarely between women and their health care 
providers, denying that fundamental right of choice that Roe v. Wade 
guaranteed.
  That practical reality means that Roe v. Wade has been far less 
effective than it could and should have been, because those opponents 
have advocated and implemented dangerous laws that undermine and 
violate a woman's right to privacy and diminish her access to 
constitutionally guaranteed reproductive health care services. These 
restrictions fall disproportionately on minorities and many who live in 
rural or medically underserved areas. I have great respect for my 
colleagues on the other side of the aisle, but we are jeopardizing the 
health care necessary for millions and millions of women and their 
right to privacy in this great country.
  I have introduced a measure that would help prevent these violations 
of rights at the State level. The Women's Health Protection Act would 
invalidate not only extreme laws such as the Texas law that is now 
before the U.S. Supreme Court but dozens of other restrictive 
legislative steps that States have implemented and introduced to block 
women from accessing safe and legal health care.
  I am happy to celebrate this anniversary of Roe v. Wade, but I think 
it is a moment to rededicate ourselves to the continuing task, more 
urgent and difficult than ever, to enable every woman to have the right 
of privacy, the right to make decisions about her own body, about 
whether and when to have children, and that fundamental right can help 
make abortion safe, legal, and rare.

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