Carter Snead
Notre Dame Law School
Director of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture,
Professor of Law
- Bioethics
- Governance of science, medicine, and biotechnology according to ethical principles
- Abortion
- Stem cell research
Video
Snead’s Latest News
Snead in the News
National Catholic Register
National Catholic Prayer Breakfast Speakers Address Attacks on Human Dignity
March 14, 2023
Catholic bioethicist Carter Snead, director of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture at the University of Notre Dame, spoke about the continued threat of abortion to the unborn and mothers.
Our Sunday Visitor
At prayer breakfast, Catholics challenged to assist Ukraine, mothers and children post-Dobbs
March 14, 2023
In addition to Archbishop Gudziak, the 2023 event also featured O. Carter Snead, director of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture, a professor of law and concurrent professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame, who called on Catholics to help build a culture of life and love post-Roe.
The Washington Post
Opinion | How much cruelty is a pork chop worth?
October 04, 2022
In addition to Scully, the brief is co-written by two other prominent conservative thinkers — Notre Dame law professor O. Carter Snead, who is also director of the university’s de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture, and journalist Mary Eberstadt, a senior research fellow at the Faith & Reason Institute.
Bloomberg
3M Knew of Earplugs’ Hearing Loss Risk, Veterans’ Group Argues
July 07, 2022
Keller Postman LLC; Ciresi Conlin LLP; Aylstock, Witkin, Kreis & Overholtz PLLC; Seeger Weiss LLP; Quinn Emmanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP; and O. Carter Snead of Notre Dame, Ind., submitted the appellate briefs for the plaintiffs.
Associated Press
Some Catholic abortion foes are uneasy about overturning Roe
May 13, 2022
Professor O. Carter Snead, who teaches law and political science at the University of Notre Dame, said via email that most Catholics engaging in anti-abortion activism “are not hard political partisans but rather people seeking to care for moms and babies by whatever means are available.”
We The People
The Dobbs v. Jackson Case – Part 3
Audio
May 12, 2022
The draft opinion in Dobbs overrules the precedents Roe v. Wade andPlanned Parenthood v. Casey, which hold that women have the constitutional right to seek pre-viability abortions. In this episode, professors Mary Ziegler of UC Davis Law School and O. Carter Snead of Notre Dame Law School join once again to unpack the constitutional reasoning in Justice Alito’s draft, and the implications for the future of abortion rights in America and the future of Court as an institution in the aftermath of the leaked opinion.
America
A better abortion debate is possible. Here’s where we can start.
May 09, 2022
And most of all, I would want people to read What It Means to Be Human, by O. Carter Snead.
The New York Times
Ten Books to Understand the Abortion Debate in the United States
May 06, 2022
‘What It Means to Be Human: The Case for the Body in Public Bioethics,’ by O. Carter Snead.
The Miami Herald
If the Supreme Court reverses on abortion, it will be righting grievous wrongs | Opinion
May 05, 2022
If the “leaked” opinion is correct and the court is prepared to reverse both Roe v Wade and Casey v. Planned Parenthood, the court will finally correct two wrongly decided decisions. As University of Notre Dame law professor O. Carter Snead noted: “The court’s abortion jurisprudence has for decades imposed on the nation, without constitutional justification, an extreme, incoherent and deeply unjust regime pursuant to specious reasoning and constantly changing rules, standards and rationales.”
The Washington Post
The leak shows why abortion policy should be returned to the states
May 05, 2022
O. Carter Snead is a law professor at the University of Notre Dame and author of “What It Means to Be Human: The Case for the Body in Public Bioethics.”
The Indiana Lawyer
Notre Dame hosts panel discussing implications of SCOTUS draft opinion leak
May 04, 2022
In the face of what has been described as an “unprecedented” breach of confidentiality at the nation’s highest court, the University of Notre Dame on Tuesday convened a panel of U.S. Supreme Court scholars to talk through the potential ramifications of the leak of a draft opinion that could fundamentally alter the country’s abortion landscape.
WNDU
Notre Dame panelists discuss ‘The Leak, The Supreme Court, and The Future of Abortion’
Video
May 03, 2022
At noon on May 3rd, a flash panel discussion held by Notre Dame’s Center for Citizenship and Constitutional Government discussed it all.
New York Daily News
Leaked draft Supreme Court opinion strikes down Roe v Wade abortion case
May 02, 2022
“The only thing to say is that, if authentic, this leak is a shocking act of betrayal and a breathtaking breach of ethics,” wrote Notre Dame law professor O. Carter Snead, an expert in bioethics and Constitutional studies.
The Daily Beast
John Roberts Is Nuts if He Thinks Saving ‘Roe v. Wade’ Is Good for SCOTUS’ Reputation
April 28, 2022
“The institutional legitimacy of the Court is at its apex when it acts as a court, interpreting the Constitution in light of its text, history, and tradition, regardless of the political consequences,” said Carter Snead, a professor of law at the University of Notre Dame (who made the same point in an amicus brief calling for the court to overturn Roe), in a text message to me on Thursday.
USA Today
Decisions on same-sex marriage, contraception could be threatened by abortion ruling
December 04, 2021
"He was drawing the substantive distinction that the right to abortion is qualitatively different from these other rights," said O. Carter Snead, law professor at the University of Notre Dame.
WNYC
Reproductive Rights and the Constitution
Audio
December 03, 2021
We wanted to understand what the Constitution says or doesn’t say about the reproductive rights that have been extended to individuals for the past 50 years, so we spoke with Carter Snead, Professor of Law at Notre Dame University, and Elizabeth Wydra, President of the Constitutional Accountability Center.
CNN
The Latin term stare decisis has been mentioned multiple times so far. Here's what it means.
December 01, 2021
But O. Carter Snead, a Notre Dame Law School professor, believes the court would be repairing its institutional legitimacy by overruling Roe.
SCOTUSBlog
We read all the amicus briefs in Dobbs so you don’t have to
December 01, 2021
Professors Mary Ann Glendon and O. Carter Snead write that the court’s abortion precedent is “completely untethered” from the text, history, and tradition of the Constitution.
Catholic News Service
All eyes are on Supreme Court for its biggest abortion case in decades
December 01, 2021
O. Carter Snead, law professor at the University of Notre Dame, similarly noted in a Nov. 29 statement the strong feelings in this Mississippi case and said that “despite the intense emotions” surrounding it,
NPR
Listen live: Supreme Court hears arguments in a landmark abortion case
Audio
December 01, 2021
O. Carter Snead, law professor at Notre Dame, comments on the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization Supreme Court case.
NPR
Law professor on his amicus brief in support of Mississippi overturning Roe v. Wade
Audio
December 01, 2021
NPR's Ari Shapiro talks with O. Carter Snead, law professor at Notre Dame, about the legal standing for anti-abortion arguments at the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
CNN
Roe v. Wade has been the law of the land for nearly 50 years. Will that matter?
November 30, 2021
But O. Carter Snead, a Notre Dame Law School professor, believes the court would be repairing its institutional legitimacy by overruling Roe.
Constitution Center
The Dobbs v. Jackson Case – Part 1
Audio
November 25, 2021
Host Jeffrey Rosen is joined by Mary Ziegler, the Stearns Weaver Miller Professor at Florida State University College of Law and author of Abortion and the Law in America: A Legal History, Roe v. Wade to the Present, and O. Carter Snead, professor of law at Notre Dame Law School and director of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture.
USA Today
'Relic of the past': Why women don't need Roe v. Wade to flourish now
October 06, 2021
Mary Ann Glendon and O. Carter Snead, professors of law at Harvard and Notre Dame universities, brilliantly argue the court should return abortion policy to the states to allow for a more harmonious human response to the challenges of an unplanned pregnancy.
National Affairs
The Case for Overturning Roe
September 21, 2021
O. CARTER SNEAD is professor of law at the Notre Dame Law School and director of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture at the University of Notre Dame.
The Washington Post
Opinion: Critics of Texas’s convoluted abortion law have a point. The solution is to overturn Roe v. Wade.
September 06, 2021
O. Carter Snead is a law professor at the University of Notre Dame and author of “What It Means to be Human: The Case for the Body in Public Bioethics.”
Our Sunday Visitor
USCCB, Catholic groups, politicians back Mississippi in court abortion case
August 03, 2021
A brief filed by O. Carter Snead, law professor at the University of Notre Dame and director of the university’s Center for Ethics and Culture, and Mary Ann Glendon, former U.S. ambassador to the Holy See, said the Mississippi case “offers the cleanest opportunity since Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973 for the court to revisit its deeply flawed and harmful jurisprudence,” or theory of law, on abortion decisions.
The Wall Street Journal
Why Shutdowns and Masks Suit the Elite
June 20, 2021
A marvelous review in these pages last November inspired me to read a new book by O. Carter Snead, “What It Means to Be Human: The Case for the Body in Human Bioethics.”
Newsweek
A Time for Courage on the Supreme Court | Opinion
May 20, 2021
O. Carter Snead, professor of law and director of the De Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture, University of Notre Dame.
The Wall Street Journal
Supreme Court to Review Mississippi Law Limiting Abortion Rights
May 17, 2021
University of Notre Dame law professor Carter Snead, a member of University Faculty for Life, said he hoped the court would “finally end its failed and constitutionally unjustified experiment as the nation’s ad hoc abortion regulatory body of last resort.”
The New York Times
Catholic leaders in the U.S. call vaccines a ‘moral obligation.’
March 06, 2021
The Catholic scholars — including Ryan T. Anderson, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center; Prof. Robert P. George of Princeton University; and Prof. O. Carter Snead of the University of Notre Dame — said in a statement that the cell line used for scientific research does not contain the remains of any human being.
The Washington Post
After days of halting statements about vaccine morality, multiple Catholic leaders call the shots urgent, important
March 05, 2021
The signers included Ryan T. Anderson, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center; Princeton University law professor Robert P. George; and O. Carter Snead, director of the University of Notre Dame’s de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture.
The New Atlantis
A Bioethics of the Strong
January 25, 2021
Orlando C. Snead, a professor of law and the director of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture at the University of Notre Dame, was general counsel to the Kass commission from 2001 to 2003, and his new book, What It Means to Be Human, can be read as a defense of the council against this sectarian charge.