Talk:Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization

Is or was?

The lead sentence of this article reads:

"Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, 597 U.S. 215 (2022), is a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court in which..." (emphasis added)

With which verb tense should we refer to cases like this? By "cases like this" I am referring to Supreme Court cases that (1) have been decided, and (2) have not been overruled. There does not appear to be any general consensus on this question. For example, at the time of writing, the lead sentences of the pages for District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. City of Chicago (two pivotal Second Amendment cases that are still good law) read:

"District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), is a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States."
"McDonald v. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742 (2010), was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States that found..."

It seems obvious to me that pending cases (e.g., at the time of writing, United States v. Skrmetti and Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton) should be referred to in the present tense ("is a pending United States Supreme Court case..."). And it seems equally obvious to me that overruled cases should be referred to in the past tense (e.g., Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey). But what about cases like Dobbs, that have been decided and have not been overruled?

Many thanks. Glad Tidings from New York (talk) 15:52, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

Generally if the decision still holds then we should write it as present tense, while overturned ones are past tense. That assumes the noun in the lead sentence is the decision, not the case. Once the case is decided, that becomes past tense, even if that decision remains on place. Masem (t) 16:14, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

Ties to Hobby Lobby in "Leaked draft opinion"

Courtesy ping @Masem given the recent back and forth. I'm trying to better flesh out the recent addition to § Leaked draft opinion and I want to start by saying I understand your concerns—I'm aware of the context that a lot of contemporaneous, let's say, suspicions by commentators have definitely tried to link the two leaks by Alito. I also agree that I think that it would be possible to put too much spin on the ball. The given citation that I've used for the additional content does opine much more about the conservative court and benefit to evangelicals:

• "Both court decisions were triumphs for conservatives and the religious right. Both majority opinions were written by Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr."
• "In early June 2014, an Ohio couple who were Mr. Schenck's star donors shared a meal with Justice Alito and his wife, Martha-Ann. A day later, Gayle Wright, one of the pair, contacted Mr. Schenck, according to an emai reviewed by The Times. "Rob, if you want some interesting news please call. No emails," she wrote.

"Mr. Schenck said Mrs. Wright told him that the decision would be favorable to Hobby Lobby, and the Justice Alito had written the majority opinnion. Three weeks later, that's exactly what happened."

The article does focus largely on Alito at times and does print his response:

• "Justice Alito, in a statement issued through the court's spokeswoman, denied disclosing the decision. He said that he and his wife shared a "casual and purely social relationship" with the Wrights, and did not dispute that the two couples ate together on June 3, 2014. But the justice said the the "allegation that the Wrights were told the outcome of the decision in the Hobby Lobby case, or the authorship of the opinion of the Court, by me or my wife, is completely false.""

References

I don't think there is harm simply stating the fact that that both were authored by Alito, it is a straight forward fact with a superficial connection, it's plain to see the author; even a reader clicking through the bluelink to Hobby Lobby would see they were both authored by Alito. And given the weight that the article puts on the connection to the Alito's I don't think it's unfair to mention the connection in text.

I thought the simple qualifier ", which was also written by Justice Alito" was pretty unassuming and minimal but maybe your thinking is it would be better to have a clearer separation. A full stop and a new sentence. Curious on thoughts as to how this should be incorporated into the article. I understand that I'm no wordsmith at times, I have to being to improve my phrasing of that section in general, I'm aware there's always room for improvement. Bobby Cohn 🍁 (talk) 13:44, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

If we are going to include that Hobby Lobby was written by Alito we need to be crystal clear from a BLP perspective that no authority has found any wrong doing by Alito. As it was added, it could be taken as a snide implicit blame on Alito which we can't do. But stating maybe with some attribution or other clarity that Alito has not been affirmed in any way as the leaker needs to be there. Masem (t) 14:18, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

I understand. I was thinking less was better but I understand the presence of the fact alone and being without the clarification is your BLP concern. I'm of two minds then with it's inclusion:

It was reported in The New York Times that knowledge of the decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby may have been shared weeks prior to its formal announcement. Both decisions were authored by Alito, though he denies any allegations that he shared knowledge of the Hobby Lobby opinion prior to its release.

I think the phrasing could be improved here. Admittedly, my fear with this is it brings more attention to the unwritten allegation that we're concerned about. Then I think we'd be bringing in non-primary citations to explain the allegations that are being made in The Times and having to explain the connection to Rev. Schenck:

Gerstein, Josh (20 November 2022). "Justice Alito denies allegation of a leak in 2014 case about access to birth control". Politico.

We could also bring in the finding in the Dobbs investigation:

It was reported in The New York Times that knowledge of the decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby may have been shared weeks prior to its formal announcement. Both decisions were authored by Alito, though he denies any allegations that he shared knowledge of the Hobby Lobby opinion prior to its release, and the investigation into the leaked Dobbs opinion was not able to identify who leaked the draft opinion.

But admittedly, I'm not sure if that makes it sound worse. I think that would definitely need to be rephrased from my suggestions here, but I am trying to get at what you're suggesting. Bobby Cohn 🍁 (talk) 17:45, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

It's getting a bit long winded that way. Has there been any investigation of the hobby leak and if so, Alito cleared from that? Masem (t) 19:32, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

No official investigation in the sourcing that I can find and no mention at Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. And then if you search who leaked hobby lobby or hobby lobby scotus leak investigation the headlines make me think this would exasperate the problem we're trying to solve. Although Alito's denial was reiterated by counsel for the Court which could add weight to it if we phrase it like that. Bobby Cohn 🍁 (talk) 20:04, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

References

Intro Paragraph

Returned intro paragraph to the 4/12/25 version—previously containing irrelevant and wrong information. (It’s not even devolution which is done statutorily.) -ArguedOyster [1]

Reverted unsupported deletions, and yes, the 10th amendment was relevant here, for reference that provision reads: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people." -Irruptive Creditor [2]

The intro paragraph right now is frankly horrible—it’s clumsily worded and contains extraneous, inaccurate information. It contains a direct quote from 2011 (surely if you quoted in the lead, it would be from the actual Court opinion). It incorrectly uses “devolving”. And it misunderstands the PBS article on the Tenth Amendment, which is beside the substance of the case anyhow.

Additionally the Tenth Amendment isn’t even referenced in the Court’s opinion, so I don’t understand how that law was “applied” in this legal case (in the template box). My edit for that was also reverted. ArguedOyster (talk) 21:38, 10 November 2025 (UTC)

I do think that needs trimming, we are not trying to explain the legal reasons in full in the lede. I know from a quick search the tenth amendment is made in analysis with the Dobbs but can't find immediately if the actual majority said that, that needs verification. Masem (t) 21:49, 10 November 2025 (UTC)