Dr. Mary L. Dudziak, Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Law and Associated Faculty in the History Department, recently weighed in on the possible implications of the Supreme Court’s summer 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson, the ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade. A leading scholar of civil rights and constitutional law history, Dudziak spoke about the reverberations of Dobbs in a Georgia Public Broadcasting article titled, “LGBTQ Georgians are staring down an uncertain future in a post-Roe America.” Read an excerpt from the article below along with the full piece here.

Emory professor Mary Dudziak said we are now in a perilous era of the Supreme Court — and their decisions will largely effect the legal landscape across states with conservative-leaning state governments.

“What would happen depends on two different kinds of things: one is what the federal courts are going to do and the other is what’s happening in state legislatures,” she said. “The boundaries of what state legislators can do is set by constitutional law. What happens on the ground is driven by state law in Georgia. A legal change has an effect on setting the terrain on what kinds of state laws would be unconstitutional. Anti-gay marriage laws are invalid under Obergefell. If that’s overruled, Georgia doesn’t have to pass a gay marriage law.”