State Paternalism for Pregnant Women
Public hospitals cannot test pregnant women for drugs and turn the results over to
police without consent, the Supreme Court said Wednesday in a ruling that
buttressed the Constitution’s protection against unreasonable searches [Ferguson v.
City of Charleston].
Some women who tested positive for drugs at a South Carolina public hospital
were arrested from their beds shortly after giving birth.
The justices ruled 6-3 that such testing without patients’ consent violates the
Constitution even though the goal was to prevent women from harming their
fetuses by using crack cocaine.
“It’s a very, very important decision in protecting the right to privacy of all
Americans,” said Priscilla Smith, lawyer for the Center for Reproductive Law and
Policy, who represented the South Carolina women. “It reaffirms that pregnant
