WHAT is the true legacy of Roe v Wade, which was decided 40
years ago today? On the one hand, that question seems obvious:
legal abortion. In Roe the Supreme Court held that the "due
process" clause of the 14th amendment contains "a concept of
personal liberty", and, building on an earlier decision that
barred states from criminalising counselling related to
contraception, that "the penumbras of the Bill of Rights"
enshrine "a right of personal privacy, or a guarantee of certain
areas or zones of privacy". It found that this right of privacy
"is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not
to terminate her pregnancy", and thus found blanket or statutory
bans on abortion unconstitutional. States could ban third-
trimester abortions, and "regulate the abortion procedure in
ways that are reasonably related to maternal health" in the
second, but in the first trimester the decision to terminate a
pregnancy was solely the province of a woman and her doctor.
But, as the past few years have shown, just