Conservative Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito on Tuesday signaled openness to reviving the Comstock Act, a 19th-century federal law that anti-abortion advocates say can be enforced as a national abortion ban.
While hearing oral arguments for a case that could reimpose restrictions on abortion pills — Food and Drug Administration v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine — Thomas and Alito pressed lawyers on whether Comstock should have banned the shipment of medication abortion drugs.
Alito asked the Justice Department, which is representing the FDA, whether the agency should have “at least” considered Comstock when it allowed for abortion pills to be accessed by mail.