Answer: As others have noted, the “right to privacy” has virtually no Constitutional textual basis. The Justices in Griswold v Connecticut couldn’t even agree to which parts of the Constitution they could point to, and ended up saying it was some short of vague “penumbra of an emanation” of the Bill of Rights, but couldn’t explain what that meant or on what specific text it was based. The “right of privacy” was concocted out of thin air, in the shadows, by a SCOTUS coterie which wanted to protect people’s right to use contraceptives in their homes, but couldn't find any legitimate Constitutional basis to proclaim such a right. So they made it up. The right action by SCOTUS would have been to acknowledge that the Federal Government has no jurisdiction over contraception or abortion, those not being enumerated to the Federal Government by the Constitution and therefore denied to it by the 10th Amendment. SCOTUS should have sent the matter back to the States and directed all Federal Courts to but out. But it didn’t, leading to all the confusion and controversy that has ensued.
