Roe v. Wade (1973 ): A Landmark Aborion Case

1. Roe v. Wade (1973): A Landmark Aborion Case By: Sarah Doverspike and Anna Holman

2. About the Case • The alias “Jane Roe” was used for Norma McCorvey. • At the age of 21, Jane falsely asserted that she was raped, which made her eligible to obtain a legal abortion in the state of Texas. • The state of Texas would not allow Jane to get an abortion after they found out that she was not raped. • Jane said that the Texas law preventing her from aborting her baby violated her First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights. • Jane filed a lawsuit against the district attorney of Dallas County, Henry Wade, and when the lawsuit failed, she appealed her case to the Supreme Court in 1971. The case was argued December 13, 1971 and reargued October 11, 1972 because of complications with the Justices.

3. The Court’s Decision • The Court issued a 7 to 2 majority vote in favor of Roe on January 22nd, 1973. • The Court deemed abortion a fundamental Constitutional right. William Rehnquist was the Chief Justice at the time of the ruling. • The Court’s decision made invalid any laws prohibiting abortion during the first three months of a woman’s pregnancy. • The Court agreed with Roe in that, as the Court put it “[The] right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the district court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy."

4. A Roe v. Wade protest in 1973 A recent Roe v. Wade protest

6. Sources • http://www.streetlaw.org/en/landmark/cases/roe_v_wade • http://www.politicalcartoons.com/cartoon/3d9bdfff-dd2e-41c2-bb96-280e7db4db29.html • http://inewp.com/?tag=people-jumping-from-twin-towers Sarah Doverspike and Anna Holman