There's no comparing minors and adults

That the gist of Kathryn Jean Lopez's column in today's NRO, regarding Supreme Court arguments in the parental-notification case Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood.

Lopez quotes generously from an amicus brief (PDF in link) written by a pair of law professors, Notre Dame's Gerard V. Bradley and Princeton's Robert P. George. Here's just one small part, using a hypothetical minor named "Jane" to highlight the plethora of laws recognizing a minor's challenges with making healthy decisions:

Jane’s reduced ability to assess probability is one factor in her poor decision-making. Her lack of life experience is another. She habitually fails to see the consequences of a particular course of action. The ill-effects of her shortsightedness are aggravated by Jane’s typically high sensitivity to peer influences. State parental notification laws, then, just make compulsory what science and common experience already tell us: the best interests of Jane lie in having her parents involved in her decision-making process.

Can I hear a "duh"?

There's so much more than this excerpt, so be sure to read the whole thing.