Basically, Roe’s logic goes like this: The 14th amendment gives everyone equal protection of the law, including from their state governments. SCOTUS historicall

Basically, Roe’s logic goes like this: The 14th amendment gives everyone equal protection of the law, including from their state governments. SCOTUS historically took that to mean that there are federal restrictions on state law. A few relevant to the history of Roe: - States are bound by the bill of rights (eg. they can’t violate your free speech for instance) - States can’t tell you where your kid has to go to school, or what they can or can’t study - States can’t restrict access to contraceptives Since the 9th amendment acknowledges the existence of rights NOT enumerated in the constitution, the court decided that it has to look at rights that are historical and customary, or contained in the “penumbra” of enumerated rights. Since you have a right to be safe from searches and seizures, and to be free from having the government quarter troops in your home, and whatever unenumerated rights exist, they’d several years prior agreed includes “marital privacy” to protect couples’ rights to choose whether to use birth control. Shortly thereafter in Roe they decided that women have a right to choose to get an abortion prior to the first trimester. They chose that cutoff based on historical and customary treatment of abortion in English common law as well as older western legal traditions. That’s a pretty brief summary, but that’s how they got there.