The Abortion Case: Roe vs. Wade

Abstract
Roe vs. Wade is one of the most controversial cases in U.S. history. The historic decision made by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1973 legalized abortion on a federal level. Now more than thirty years later people all over the country are trying to overturn the decision as well as striving to keep it intact.

The Abortion Case: Roe vs. Wade
A Texas law that made abortion a crime except when in the case of saving the mothers life was overruled by the United States Supreme Court on January 22, 1973 . In 1970, abortion was illegal for women who live in many of the states of the U.S. until a woman by the name of Norma McCorvey also known as Jane Roe decided it was time to make a change. McCorvey
The plaintiff’s attorneys wanted the court to decide whether or not a pregnant woman had the right to decide for herself if the abortion was necessary. The arguments were built on the Ninth Amendment which protects implicit rights hinted at but not explicated elsewhere in the Constitution and on the Fourteenth Amendment which prohibits states from denying citizens life, liberty, or property without due process of the law. In the 1965 Grinswold v. Connecticut case the U.S. Supreme Court established that a constitutional right to privacy was found in both the Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments so Weddington and Coffee argued that the Texas abortion law denied Roe her right to privacy which should protect the right of a woman to decide whether or not to become a mother. The defendant tried arguing that a fetus has legal rights which must be protected by the Constitution claiming “that the right of the child to life is superior to that of a woman’s right to privacy.” The judges ruled that the Texas law did in fact violate Roe’s right to privacy in the Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments and that a woman did have a right to terminate her pregnancy if she wished. The case then proceeded to the U.S. Supreme Court on appeal.

Supreme Court Hearing
Weddington, Coffee, Tolles and Floyd stood before the Supreme Court on December 13, 1971. At that time, 42 friend of the court (amici curlae) briefs were filed with the court supporting a woman’s right to choose an