The Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade and Casey v. Planned Parenthood on Friday, dismantling the decades-old precedent that protected abortion rights and giving states the go-ahead to dramatically limit access to reproductive health care.

The ruling in the Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization case, written by Justice Samuel Alito, was not a surprise. A draft ruling was leaked to Politico and published in early May ; the final ruling hews closely to the leaked draft.

We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled, Alito wrote for the majority. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision, including the one on which the defenders of Roe and Casey now chiefly relythe Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

That provision has been held to guarantee some rights that are not mentioned in the Constitution, but any such right must be deeply rooted in this Nations history and tradition and implicit in the concept of ordered liberty, Alito continued.

Abortion is not deeply rooted in this Nations history and tradition, according to Alito, and, therefore, not protected as a right.

Alito was joined in his decision by Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote a separate concurrence, while the liberal minority of Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor filed a joint dissent.

The hard-line conservative ruling will now go nationwide, allowing states to implement strict abortion restrictions that will force some people to continue unwanted and unsafe pregnancies. Victims of rape and incest will, in some states, have to go through the traumas of pregnancy, birth and parenthood or adoption. Babies will be born with health conditions they suffer from and even quickly die from. People who arent prepared or dont want to have children will have to have them anyway.

The ruling does not end abortion rights entirely. Some states have vowed to protect abortion access and will likely become a safe haven for those seeking the procedure who are able to afford to travel. Its unclear how quickly the 22 states that already have laws limiting abortion will put their bans into effect, but some, including Missouri and Texas, acted quickly to enact their trigger bans in the wake of the ruling. And most state bans restrict abortion only after a certain point in a pregnancy, often with exceptions.

However, thats not always the case. In Oklahoma, the GOP-controlled legislature passed a bill that would prohibit all abortions, except if the life of the pregnant person was in danger or if a rape had been reported to law enforcement. In other states, Republicans are increasingly pushing abortion restrictions that offer no exceptions for victims of rape or incest.

And some efforts to enshrine abortion rights have failed. Senate Republicans blocked a bill to codify Roe v. Wade in May. The GOP holds an electoral advantage in many states due to district lines and electoral laws.

The case came before the court as conservatives sensed momentum when former President Donald Trump, who promised to only appoint conservatives who would overturn Roe v. Wade, appointed three Supreme Court justices. One of those seats was filled by Trump only after Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) refused to allow then-President Barack Obama to appoint a justice to the seat left vacant by Justice Antonin Scalias death in 2016. The die was then cast after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburgs death weeks before the 2020 election allowed Trump to appoint Barrett to give the conservatives a supermajority on the court.

For this reason, Alitos majority did not need the vote of Roberts, who did not join the other conservative justices and filed a separate concurrence. In his concurrence, Roberts declared that Alitos opinion was wholly unnecessary to decide the case brought by Mississippi.

Surely we should adhere closely to principles of judicial restraint, where the broader path the Court chooses entails repudiating a constitutional right we have not only previously recognized, but also expressly reaffirmed applying the doctrine of stare decisis Roberts wrote. The Courts opinion is thoughtful and thorough, but those virtues cannot compensate for the fact that its dramatic and consequential ruling is unnecessary to decide the case before us.

The liberal justices joint dissent notes their sorrow at the ruling and the pain and hardship it will bring to those now forced to bear children in the states where abortion is now illegal.

With sorrowfor this Court, but more, for the many millions of American women who have today lost a fundamental constitutional protectionwe dissent, they wrote.