If Roe Overturned, Pro-Life Movement Faces Challenges

As the arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization begin today at the Supreme Court, it’s worth remembering that this long, generational march of the pro-life movement is only a march to the starting line for the real race. The issue before the Court is not the morality of abortion. All that is at issue is whether the people, through their state legislatures, are able to limit and regulate the practice of abortion — whether abortion is a fundamental constitutional right or a matter for self-governing people to determine democratically. A huge, against-all-odds victory that vitiates the holding of Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey would only mean the restoration of American self-governance on the issue of abortion. The legal movement to restore constitutional rule on the issue is only the prelude to a true democratic pro-life movement.

If Roe is overturned or weakened to the point where state legislatures get active, you will see blue states try to re-create in their own territories the legal free-for-all that existed these last five decades. Some red states will restrict abortion to the point where very few abortion providers remain in their states. And each of these restrictions will be probed for moral coherence.

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Michael Brendan Dougherty

Michael Brendan Dougherty is a senior writer at National Review Online.

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As the arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization begin today at the Supreme Court, it’s worth remembering that this long, generational march of the pro-life movement is only a march to the starting line for the real race. The issue before the Court is not the morality of abortion. All that is at issue is whether the people, through their state legislatures, are able to limit and regulate the practice of abortion — whether abortion is a fundamental constitutional right or a matter for self-governing people to determine democratically. A huge, against-all-odds victory that vitiates the holding of Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey would only mean the restoration of American self-governance on the issue of abortion. The legal movement to restore constitutional rule on the issue is only the prelude to a true democratic pro-life movement.

If Roe is overturned or weakened to the point where state legislatures get active, you will see blue states try to re-create in their own territories the legal free-for-all that existed these last five decades. Some red states will restrict abortion to the point where very few abortion providers remain in their states. And each of these restrictions will be probed for moral coherence.