Roe v. Wade: Supreme Court Grants Abortion Rights

Seven justices sided with a Texas woman named "Jane Roe" and overturned abortion laws in 46 states in a single decision. On January 22, 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in Roe v. Wade that the Constitution''s implied right to privacy extended to a woman''s decision to terminate a pregnancy. The ruling instantly became one of the most consequential and divisive in American legal history. The case originated with Norma McCorvey, a 22-year-old from Dallas who in 1969 sought an abortion she could not legally obtain in Texas. Attorneys Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington took her case, arguing that Texas''s 1854 abortion statute violated the Fourteenth Amendment. The case wound through the federal courts for three years before reaching the Supreme Court, where it was argued twice—once in December 1971 and again in October 1972. Justice Harry Blackmun, a Nixon appointee, wrote the majority opinion. The decision established a trimester framework: during the first trimester, the abortion decision was left entirely to a woman and her doctor. In the second trimester, states could regulate the procedure to protect maternal health. Only in the third trimester, when fetal viability was reached, could states prohibit abortion. Justices Byron White and William Rehnquist dissented, with White calling the ruling "an exercise of raw judicial power." The decision galvanized both sides of the abortion debate for the next half-century. It energized the religious right, transformed Supreme Court nominations into political battlegrounds, and became a defining fault line in American politics. The ruling stood for 49 years until the Court''s Dobbs v. Jackson decision in June 2022 overturned Roe entirely, returning abortion regulation to individual states and reigniting a legal and political firestorm that continues to shape American elections.