In the wake of Roe v. Wade’s fall, America teeters on the precipice of an unsettling new reality—one in which birth control itself stands vulnerable. If the foundational Caroline Products case is overturned, the consequences will ripple far beyond mere economic considerations. The ruling, infamous for its “footnote four,” defers economic and unenumerated rights—including privacy—to state legislatures, effectively stripping away constitutional protections and subjecting deeply personal freedoms to political whims.

With reproductive rights already severely curtailed and abortion banned across numerous states, contraception is the next target. The logic is chillingly straightforward: birth control, reliance interests, like abortion, hinges on the unenumerated right of privacy identified in Griswold v. Connecticut. Without heightened judicial scrutiny, state legislatures would have unchecked power to outlaw contraception entirely.

The collapse of Griswold would mean more than empty pharmacy shelves—it would signify the end of personal autonomy in family planning, pushing America back toward an era where women’s health is dictated solely by political mandates. Planned Parenthood clinics, long the frontline defense for reproductive healthcare, would vanish into memory, leaving women with nowhere to turn.

But the rollback would not end there. Overturning Caroline Products would embolden legislators to revisit Loving v. Virginia, potentially dismantling the right to interracial marriage under the same twisted logic. And further still, the return to state-sanctioned segregation under “separate but equal” doctrines could rear its ugly head once more, dragging society backward into its darkest chapters.

In such a dystopian future, the nation would indeed resemble Margaret Atwood’s grim prophecy in “The Handmaid’s Tale,” with personal freedoms stripped away layer by layer. Privacy, autonomy, equality—all sacrificed on an altar of ideological fervor, leaving only echoes of what was once considered basic human dignity.