Former DOJ Officials Amicus Brief in Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA
Brief filed in support of the FDA in Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA.
Amici are former high-ranking U.S. Department of Justice officials who served in administrations of both major parties, including as U.S. Attorney General, Deputy Attorney General, Assistant Attorney General, and U.S. Attorney.
In this brief, former high-ranking officials from both major parties, who hold opposing views on the moral and jurisprudential aspects of abortion, argue the District Court wrongly assumed that the FDA has the authority under the Food, Drug & Cosmetic Act to consider unrelated laws when it reviews applications for approval of new drugs. FDA’s role is to determine the safety and efficacy of drugs based on scientific evidence and not to purport to enforce laws over which they do not have enforcement authority. Amici also demonstrate how the court’s interpretation of the Comstock Laws from 1873—federal anti-vice law that criminalizes the mailing of abortion drugs when intended for use in unlawful abortions—was wrong and its rejection of DOJ’s interpretation of those laws misplaced.
This brief was one of many filed in support of the FDA in Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA. For more information on the case, click here.