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Posts: 84
02/12/10 4:44 PM
Johnsen filed an amicus brief in the 1989 Supreme Court case Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, which centered around a Missouri law that did not ban abortions but restricted the use of state funds to finance them. Johnsen asserted that by means of this restriction, the state was “conscript[ing]” women’s bodies “for its own ends,” and was relegating many women to a state of “forced pregnancy” and “involuntary servitude” where they were compelled “to provide continuous physical service to the fetus in order to further the state’s asserted interest [in the life of the unborn].” According to Johnsen, any and all restrictions on abortion, however slight, had the effect of “reduc[ing] pregnant women to no more than fetal containers.”