Telling Stories in the Supreme Court: Voices Briefs and the Role of Democracy in Constitutional Deliberation

Abstract

On January 4, 2016, over 100 women lawyers, law professors, and former judges told the world that they had had an abortion. In a daring amicus brief filed in Whole Woman 's Health v. Hellerstedt, the women spoke publicly about one of the most private decisions a woman can make. Their participation in this brief, which captured national media attention, marked their "coming out" to their clients and to all of their former, present, and future supervisors and colleagues; to the judges for whom they have clerked; and to the Justices of the Supreme Court.