Roe, Dobbs and the future: 50 years of Supreme Court rulings on abortion

Fifty years ago today, a seven-member majority of the U.S. Supreme Court signed onto Justice Harry Blackmun’s decision in Roe v. Wade holding that “for the stage prior to approximately the end of the first trimester, the abortion decision and its effectuation must be left to the medical judgment of the pregnant woman’s attending physician.” Seven months ago, an activist “conservative” majority threw out that settled precedent, giving state legislatures free rein to bar the procedure.

When the Dobbs decision came down, those who call themselves pro-life exalted. Those who believe in a woman’s right to make the painful choice to terminate a pregnancy were despondent. The 212 days since have been an extended be-careful-what-you-wish-for moment for abortion foes. Rhetoric about respecting life is easy, playing to passions and deeply held moral and religious beliefs. Crafting and implementing laws that treat women and doctors as killers is hard — and incurs the wrath of voters who want the government to stay out of this intimate arena.

The hypocrite named Donald Trump, who as president stacked the court with the three hardline right-wing justices needed to eviscerate Roe, was right when he worried last year that the ruling would be “bad for Republicans” and branded blanket state abortion bans “so stupid.” The issue buoyed Democrats in November’s midterm elections. In five state ballot measures, voters either endorsed abortion rights or rejected restricting abortion, proving that a major August win in Kansas was not anomalous.

Though many Americans are indeed uncomfortable with unrestricted abortion, that doesn’t mean they support a blanket prohibition. Nor does it mean they support the philosophically consistent but horribly cruel practice of forbidding abortion for rape and incest victims. Nor does it mean they want to ban prescription drugs that facilitate half of all terminations, which the federal government under President Biden and New York under Mayor Adams are understandably making more widely available.

For the 50th consecutive year, there will be protests and counter protests. For the first time in generations, the louder voices will be the righteous ones.