What is Roe vs. Wade?

 January 22, 1973 was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court to establish a woman’s right to have an abortion without undue restrictive interference from the government. The Court held that a woman’s right to decide for herself to bring or not to bring a pregnancy to term is guaranteed under the Fourteenth Amendment. It is a decision based on the guarantee of women’s access to personal healthcare in America and the right to privacy.

The Divided Opinions of Americans.

PRO-CHOICE: Those in America who believe women get to decide if they would like to choose to have an abortion or not to have an abortion. The word choice is something everyone believes but those who call themselves “Pro-Life” respond by saying “It is a child, not a choice”; they believe the choice was already made before the pregnancy and the consequences are a responsibility to care for the unborn.  A Pro Choice American may say that it is not a child until it is born and therefore there is not Constitutional right to life that is more important than the woman’s right to choose.  Pro choice Americans tend to vote more democratic. The justices that voted against overturning Roe vs Wade were those appointed by Democrat Presidents.

The current justices on the Supreme Court who were appointed by Democrat Presidents are:

Sonia Sotomayor : President Barack Obama nominated her as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on May 26, 2009, and she assumed this role August 8, 2009.

Elena Kagan : In 2009, President Obama nominated her as the Solicitor General of the United States. A year later, the President nominated her as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on May 10, 2010. She took her seat on August 7, 2010.

Ketanji Brown Jackson : President Joseph R. Biden, Jr., appointed her to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2021 and then nominated her as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court in 2022. She took her seat on June 30, 2022.

PRO-LIFE: Someone that is against abortion will call themselves  Pro-Life.  While all Americans on some level value the right to life not all define that right equally.  The belief that all human life is equally sacred and the unborn especially should be protected. They protect what they believe usually with religious motivations. “Ending a life is murder legally and ethically, even a life that is only a few growing cells at the time of death”.  Some woman will struggle without abortion, but that does not give you the option to excuse or justify killing someone.  All of the justices who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade are appointed by Republican Presidents.

The current justices on the Supreme Court who were appointed by Republican Presidents are:

Samuel A. Alito, Jr : He was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in 1990. President George W. Bush nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat January 31, 2006.

Brett M. Kavanaugh : He was appointed a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2006. President Donald J. Trump nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat on October 6, 2018.

Amy Coney Barrett : She was appointed a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in 2017. President Donald J. Trump nominated her as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and she took her seat on October 27, 2020.

For more information on the biographies of current US Supreme Court Justices  https://www.supremecourt.gov/about/biographies.aspx

For more information on the arguments for and against federally protected legal abortion GO HERE

How did Roe vs. Wade get reversed?

Before the end of his Presidency, Barack Obama appointed a nominee that was never voted on by the Republican majority Congress. President Trump appointed 3 conservative justices to the Supreme Court during his 4 year term. The fact that President Trump ran on a conservative “pro-life” platform likely ensured his victory in the 2016 election because many religious social conservatives overlooked his flaws in order to have a President who would support the pro-life agenda. The Pro-Life movement has been a conservative social force since the 1972 decision of Roe vs. Wade.

Why Now?  Every Supreme Court has a session that runs through June or early July and the Conservative Justices finally had their majority. Chief Justice Roberts was the only conservative justice who did not vote to overturn Roe vs. Wade because he throught that it would be going against a long established precedent.

The Roberts Court, April 23, 2021
Seated from left to right: Justices Samuel A. Alito, Jr. and Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., and Justices Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor
Standing from left to right: Justices Brett M. Kavanaugh, Elena Kagan, Neil M. Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett.
Photograph by Fred Schilling, Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States (Fred Schilling, Collection of th)