Cases Preceding & Following Roe v.

Wade (1973)

What is the right to privacy and where did it come from?

Read and summarize each of the following cases, explaining the story behind the
case, the constitutional issues involved (from both sides), the Courts decision and
rationale, and the precedent resulting from the case.
o Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)
o Roe v. Wade (1973)
o Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989)
o Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992)
o Gonzales v. Carhart (2007)
Read the commentary following the cases:
o Cass Sunstein, The Fate of Roe v. Wade and Choice
o 35 Years after Roe: A Legacy of Law and Morality
Do you agree or disagree with Sunsteins notion that opposition to Roe code for
other constitutional changes conservatives want to implement?

Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)

Facts of the Case:
Griswold was the Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut. Both
she and the Medical Director for the League gave information, instruction, and other medical
advice to married couples concerning birth control. Griswold and her colleague were convicted
under a Connecticut law which criminalized the provision of counseling, and other medical
treatment, to married persons for purposes of preventing conception.
Question:
Does the Constitution protect the right of marital privacy against state restrictions on a couple's
ability to be counseled in the use of contraceptives?
Conclusion:
Though the Constitution does not explicitly protect a general right to privacy, the various
guarantees within the Bill of Rights create penumbras, or zones, that establish a right to privacy.
Together, the First, Third, Fourth, and Ninth Amendments, create a new constitutional right, the
right to privacy in marital relations. The Connecticut statute conflicts with the exercise of this
right and is therefore null and void.

Roe v. Wade (1973)

Roe v. Wade, case decided in 1973 by the U.S. Supreme Court. Along with Doe v. Bolton, this
decision legalized abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy. The decision, written by Justice
Harry Blackmun and based on the residual right of privacy, struck down dozens of state
antiabortion statutes. The decision was based on two cases, that of an unmarried woman from
Texas, where abortion was illegal unless the mother's life was at risk, and that of a poor, married
mother of three from Georgia, where state law required permission for an abortion from a panel
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of doctors and hospital officials. While establishing the right to an abortion, this decision gave
states the right to intervene in the second and third trimesters of pregnancy to protect the
woman and the potential life of the unborn child. Denounced by the National Council of
Bishops, the decision gave rise to a vocal antiabortion movement that put pressure on the
courts and created an anti-Roe litmus test for the judicial appointments of the Reagan and Bush
administrations (198193). In a 1989 case, Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, the court,
while not striking down Roe, limited its scope, permitting states greater latitude in regulating and
restricting abortions. Then in 1992, in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the court reaffirmed the
abortion rights granted in Roe v. Wade, while permitting further restrictions. (Infoplease.com)
Historical Background
Since the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade, the legal, moral, and political controversy
surrounding the abortion issue has polarized the American public. Two campsone hailing Roe
as a victory for choice, the other arguing that the decision deprives the unborn child of its right
to lifesquared off in the wake of the Court's decision. Their protracted political battle
continues today. The deep political divisions that the case created, or revealed, reflect not only
conflicting social and moral views, but conflicting views of the law as well. The case pitted two
accepted doctrines against one anotherthe individual's right to privacy and the compelling
and overriding interest of a State. Roe v. Wade sought an extension of the right to privacy,
which the Court explicitly recognized for the first time in the case Griswold v. Connecticut, 1965.
In that case, family counselors in Connecticut challenged a State law forbidding the use of any
drug, medicinal article or instrument for the purpose of preventing conception. In Griswold, the
Court decided that there was a right of privacy implied by the Bill of Rights. It ruled that the 1st,
3rd, 4th, 5th, 9th, and 14th Amendments together create a right of marital privacy.
Circumstances of the Case
In Texas, State law prohibited the termination of a pregnancy by artificial means (surgery)
except when the life of the mother was in danger. The statute was construed as a nearly
complete ban on abortion. A Texas woman, claiming privacy as a fundamental right,
challenged the Texas statute. In 1971 the case was argued before the Supreme Court. In 1972
it was argued again. Roe and a companion case from Georgia, Doe v. Bolton, were the first
cases to test, in the Court, the newly recognized right of privacy against the compelling
interest of the States to regulate abortions.
Constitutional Issues
This case involved the right of privacy as implied by Amendments 1, 3, 4, 5, 9, and 14 versus
the police power of the States. Did States have a compelling and overriding interest in
regulating the health, safety, and morals of the community? Was there an area of personal,
marital, familial, and sexual privacy protected by the Bill of Rights? Was the Texas law an
unreasonable invasion of privacy, or was it a reasonable exercise of the police power? Were
women permitted to terminate pregnancies at will, or were fetuses persons with rights to be
protected by the State?
Arguments
For Roe: Under the Bill of Rights, a woman has the right to terminate her pregnancy. It is
improper for a State to deny individuals the personal, marital, familial, and sexual right to
privacy. Moreover, in no case in its history has the Court declared that a fetusa developing
infant in the wombis a person. Therefore, the fetus cannot be said to have any legal right to
life. Because it is unduly intrusive, the Texas law is unconstitutional and should be overturned.
For Wade: The State has a duty to protect prenatal life. Life is present at the moment of
conception. The unborn are people, and as such are entitled to protection under the
Constitution. The Texas law is a valid exercise of police powers reserved to the States in order
to protect the health and safety of citizens, including the unborn. The law is constitutional and
should be upheld.
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Decision and Rationale

By a vote of 7-2, with Justices White and Rehnquist in dissent, the Court agreed with Roe and
upheld her right to terminate a pregnancy in the first trimester (90 days). The Court observed
that Section 1 of the 14th Amendment contained three references to person. In his majority
opinion, Justice Blackmun noted that, for nearly all such references in the Constitution, use of
the word is such that it has application only postnatally. None indicates, with any assurance, that
it has any possible prenatal application.
Blackmun's opinion carefully steered between the right to privacy and the question of
compelling State interest. On the first point, he wrote, the majority of the justices do not agree
with Texas that the State may override the rights of the pregnant woman that are at stake. On
the other hand, the State does have an important and legitimate interest in protecting the
potentiality of human life and in protecting the mother's health. Blackmun's decision revolved
around the development of the fetus during pregnancy. He held that during the first trimester, or
three months, of a pregnancy, the woman in consultation with her physician had an unrestricted
right to an abortion. During the second trimester, States could regulate abortion to protect a
woman's health. Finally, during the third trimester, the State's interest in protecting the potential
life of the fetus was sufficient to justify severe restrictions.
Approaching the matter of when life begins, Blackmun was clearly hesitant to commit the Court
to any position.
Controversial when announced, the Roe decision remains at the center of the legal controversy
over the right to privacy versus the rights of the unborn. In Planned Parenthood of Southeastern
Pennsylvania v. Casey, 1992, the Court reaffirmed Roe's central holding but abandoned its
trimester structure. The Court permitted States to require informed consent, a 24-hour waiting
period, and/or parental notification, but held that States may not place an undue burdenon a
woman's right to an abortion.

Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989)

Facts of the Case:
In 1986, the state of Missouri enacted legislation that placed a number of restrictions on
abortions. The statute's preamble indicated that "[t]he life of each human being begins at
conception," and the law codified the following restrictions: public employees and public facilities
were not to be used in performing or assisting abortions unnecessary to save the mother's life;
encouragement and counseling to have abortions was prohibited; and physicians were to
perform viability tests upon women in their twentieth (or more) week of pregnancy. Lower courts
struck down the restrictions.
Question:
Did the Missouri restrictions unconstitutionally infringe upon the right to privacy or the Equal
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment?
Conclusion:
In a controversial and highly fractured decision, the Court held that none of the challenged
provisions of the Missouri legislation were unconstitutional. First, the Court held that the
preamble had not been applied in any concrete manner for the purposes of restricting abortions,
and thus did not present a constitutional question. Second, the Court held that the Due Process
Clause did not require states to enter into the business of abortion, and did not create an
affirmative right to governmental aid in the pursuit of constitutional rights. Third, the Court found
that no case or controversy existed in relation to the counseling provisions of the law. Finally,
the Court upheld the viability testing requirements, arguing that the State's interest in protecting
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potential life could come into existence before the point of viability. The Court emphasized that it
was not revisiting the essential portions of the holding in Roe v. Wade.

Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992)

Facts of the Case:
The Pennsylvania legislature amended its abortion control law in 1988 and 1989. Among the
new provisions, the law required informed consent and a 24 hour waiting period prior to the
procedure. A minor seeking an abortion required the consent of one parent (the law allows for a
judicial bypass procedure). A married woman seeking an abortion had to indicate that she
notified her husband of her intention to abort the fetus. These provisions were challenged by
several abortion clinics and physicians. A federal appeals court upheld all the provisions except
for the husband notification requirement.
Question:
Can a state require women who want an abortion to obtain informed consent, wait 24 hours,
and, if minors, obtain parental consent, without violating their right to abortions as guaranteed
by Roe v. Wade?
Conclusion:
In a bitter, 5-to-4 decision, the Court again reaffirmed Roe, but it upheld most of the
Pennsylvania provisions. For the first time, the justices imposed a new standard to determine
the validity of laws restricting abortions. The new standard asks whether a state abortion
regulation has the purpose or effect of imposing an "undue burden," which is defined as a
"substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion before the fetus attains
viability." Under this standard, the only provision to fail the undue-burden test was the husband
notification requirement. The opinion for the Court was unique: It was crafted and authored by
three justices.

Gonzalez v. Carhart (2007)

Facts of the Case:
In 2003, Congress passed and the President signed the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act. The
controversial concept of partial-birth abortion is defined in the Act as any abortion in which the
death of the fetus occurs when "the entire fetal head [...] or [...] any part of the fetal trunk past
the navel is outside the body of the mother." Dr. Leroy Carhart and other physicians who
perform late-term abortions sued to stop the Act from going into effect. The plaintiffs argued that
the Act could apply to a more common abortion procedure known as "D&E" ("dilation and
evacuation"), as well as to the less common "intact D&E," sometimes called D&X ("dilation and
extraction"). With this application the Act would ban most late-term abortions and thus be an
unconstitutional "undue burden" on the right to an abortion, as defined by the Supreme Court in
Planned Parenthood v. Casey. The plaintiffs also argued that the Act's lack of an exception for
abortions necessary to protect the health of the mother rendered it unconstitutional under the
Supreme Court's decision in Stenberg v. Carhart, regardless of Congress's finding in the Act
that partial-birth abortions are never medically necessary.
A federal District Court agreed and ruled the Act unconstitutional on both grounds. The
government appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. The government argued
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that the Act only bans a narrow category of abortion procedures, and that a health exception is
not required when Congress determines that a banned abortion procedure is never necessary
for the health of the mother. The Eighth Circuit disagreed and upheld the District Court, ruling
that a health exception is required for all bans on abortion procedures when "substantial
medical authority" supports the necessity of the procedure. The Circuit Court ruled that the
ongoing disagreement among medical experts over the necessity of intact D&E abortions was
sufficient to establish that the Act was unconstitutional without a health exception. The Circuit
Court did not reach the question of whether the Act was so broad as to qualify as an
unconstitutional "undue burden."
Question:
Is the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 an unconstitutional violation of personal liberty
protected by the Fifth Amendment because the Act lacks an exception for partial-birth abortions
necessary to protect the health of the mother?
Conclusion:
No. The Court ruled by a 5-4 vote that Congress's ban on partial-birth abortion was not
unconstitutionally vague and did not impose an undue burden on the right to an abortion.
Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the opinion for the majority. The Court held that, under the most
reasonable interpretation, the Act applies only to the intact D&E method (also known as "partialbirth abortion") and not to the more common D&E procedure. The Act's application was limited
by provisions that restrict enforcement to cases where the physician intends to perform an intact
D&E and delivers the still-living fetus past specific "anatomical landmarks." Because the
majority found that the Act applies only to a specific method of abortion, it held that the ban was
not unconstitutionally vague, overbroad, or an undue burden on the decision to obtain an
abortion. The Court also held that Congress, after finding intact D&E never to be medically
necessary, could validly omit a health exception from the ban, even when "some part of the
medical community" considers the procedure necessary. To require the exception whenever
"medical uncertainty" exists would be "too exacting a standard to impose on the legislative
power [...] to regulate the medical profession." The Court left open the possibility that an asapplied challenge could be brought against the Act if it were ever applied in a situation in which
an intact D&E was necessary to preserve a woman's health. Justice Ginsburg's dissent disputed
the majority's claim that the opinion was consistent with the Casey and Stenberg precedents
and said "The Court's hostility to the right Roe and Casey secured is not concealed."

The fate of Roe v. Wade and choice

By Cass Sunstein | September 14, 2008

THE RIGHT to reproductive freedom has played an occasional role in many presidential
campaigns, but its fate is likely to turn on the 2008 election. Republican presidential candidate
John McCain vows to "return the abortion question to the individual states" and then "to end
abortion at the state level." The new president will probably be in a position to appoint at least
one and perhaps as many as three new justices. With an excellent chance to reconfigure the
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Supreme Court, McCain, if elected, might well be able to get what the antiabortion movement
wants - and more fundamentally, numerous changes in other areas of constitutional law as well.
Those who seek to preserve the right to choose ought to be prepared to make some
distinctions. As it was written in 1973, Roe v. Wade was far from a model of legal reasoning, and
conservatives have been correct to criticize it. The court failed to root the abortion right in either
the text of the Constitution or its own precedents.
Moreover, it ruled far too broadly. In its first encounter with the abortion question, the court failed
to focus on the particular abortion restrictions at issue, some of which were unusually draconian,
forbidding abortion even in cases of rape. Instead, the court took the highly unusual step of a
setting out a series of rules for legislatures to follow.
It is no wonder that millions of Americans felt, and continue to feel, that the court refused to treat
their moral convictions with respect. Nor is it surprising that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg - the
most important women's rights lawyer in the history of American law, but also a judicial
"minimalist" - has sharply criticized Roe for doing so much so fast.
But it is one thing to object to Roe as written in 1973. It is another to suggest that it should be
overruled in 2008. American constitutional law is stable only because of the principle of stare
decisis, which means that in general, the Court should respect its own precedents.
Roe v. Wade has been established law for 35 years; the right to choose is now a part of our
culture. A decision to overrule it would not only disrupt and polarize the nation; it would also
threaten countless doctors, and pregnant women and girls, with jail sentences and criminal
fines. As Ginsburg has also urged, Roe v. Wade is now best seen, not only as a case about
privacy, but also as involving sex equality.
No one should disparage the convictions of those who believe that abortion is an immoral act.
But after more than three decades, a decision to overrule Roe v. Wade, and to throw an
established domain of human liberty into turmoil, would be anything but conservative. It is
relevant here that many people, including McCain running mate Sarah Palin, believe that
abortion is unacceptable even in cases of rape and incest, and there is little doubt that if Roe is
overruled, some states will enact that belief into law.
For the future of constitutional rights, there is a broader point, which involves the fragility of
many constitutional principles. Of course the Supreme Court tends to move slowly, but some
conservatives who speak of "strict construction," and of "legislating from the bench," have
something quite radical in mind.
For them, these are code words. They seek to appoint judges who will overturn not merely Roe,
but dozens of other past decisions. For example, they want judges to impose flat bans on
affirmative action, to invalidate environmental regulations, to increase presidential power, and to
reduce the separation of church and state. Some Republican appointees to the Supreme Court
have already called for significant changes in constitutional law in these domains.
Does all this sound like "strict construction"? Actually there is an uncomfortably close overlap
between the constitutional views of some recent Republican appointees to the federal judiciary
and the political views of those on the extreme right-wing of the Republican Party. There is a
good chance that a newly constituted Supreme Court would entrench some of those views into
constitutional law.
It is inevitable that the principal debates between McCain and Democratic candidate Barack
Obama will involve the economy and foreign policy. For most voters, the Supreme Court is
simply too abstract. But we should not overlook a crucial point: The fate of Roe v. Wade, and of
countless principles in constitutional law, is now hanging in the balance.
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Cass Sunstein is a professor of law at Harvard Law School and an informal adviser to the
Obama campaign.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

35 years after Roe: A legacy of law and morality

Story Highlights:

35th anniversary of January 22, 1973, Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade

36 percent of Americans say abortion should be legal in most or all circumstances

40 percent believe it should be available in a few circumstances, poll says

22 percent say abortion should never be legal, poll says

From CNN Supreme Court Producer Bill Mears

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Thirty-five years since Roe v. Wade, and little, it seems, has changed.
The January 22, 1973, Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion remains the law of the land,
and passions remain high on both sides of the issue, with annual protests on the anniversary.
Access to abortion, then and now, is more than just about simple legalities. Social, religious and
family values, as well as finances and politics, still play a role in shaping the abortion issue, but
many legal and medical experts say the debate has become predictable.
"Much of the controversy about abortion is really stimulated by the interest groups on both sides
of the political question, rather than by ordinary Americans," said David Garrow, a law professor
at Cambridge University, and a longtime Supreme Court scholar. "The American people and
many political leaders have already made up their minds about legal abortion."
Public opinion on abortion has remained remarkably stable over the years. A CNN/Opinion
Research survey in October found 36 percent of Americans think abortion should be legal in
most or all circumstances, 40 percent believe it should be available in a few circumstances,
such as to save the mother's life, and 22 percent say abortion should never be legal. That is
almost unchanged in the past 15 years.
The Roe decision did not prompt "abortion on demand," as many opponents of the procedure
predicted it would. Nor have various legislatures or court rulings restricted access as much as
some supporters claim.
New research from the Alan Guttmacher Institute found the rate of abortions is at its lowest level
since Roe, and the total number is also in decline, about 1.2 million in the year 2005, down 25
percent since the all-time high in 1990.
For the Supreme Court justices, Roe reflected earlier cases involving the right to privacy. That
"right," wrote Justice Harry Blackmun in the main opinion for the court, is "broad enough to
encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy."
"Prior to Roe," said Garrow, "whether one could obtain a legal abortion in the face of an
unwanted pregnancy was a crapshoot. For 30 years now, it's been a constitutionally guaranteed
right."
But the ruling was a qualified one, as many anti-abortion supporters have noted over the years,
and that fact has been used by them in their efforts to narrow the scope of other abortion
provisions. Blackmun noted the state's "important interests in safeguarding health, maintaining
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medical standards, and protecting potential life" are compelling enough to justify regulation "at
some point in pregnancy."
That "qualified right" found its form in the controversial "trimester analysis" laid out by the
justices in Roe: permitting no government regulation during the first three months; allowing
limited regulation in the second trimester to protect women's health and safety; and granting
government the power to ban abortions during the third trimester -- in which medical consensus
has concluded the fetus is capable of living on its own.
After Roe, the high court affirmed the right to abortion in subsequent cases: striking down a
provision requiring a husband's consent for a first-trimester abortion and a provision requiring
parental consent for an unmarried woman under 18; striking down efforts to expand on laws
requiring women to give informed consent before having an abortion; striking down a 24-hour
waiting period; and striking down a law requiring doctors to inform women of the risks and of
assistance available if she completed pregnancy.
But there was one notable victory for anti-abortionist activists: banning use of taxpayer funds to
finance abortions for poor women.
The abortion issue has been revisited several times since Roe, most famously in two cases:
Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989) and Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992).
Webster (a 5-4 decision) upheld major parts of a Missouri abortion law that prohibited use of
public facilities or the participation of public employees in abortions, and required doctors to test
the viability of a fetus before performing an abortion.
Justices William Rehnquist, Byron White and Anthony Kennedy said they would allow
restrictions on abortion, but only if the restrictions had a rational basis. More important, the three
conservative justices said a compelling government interest need not be required to justify
restrictions on abortion. That was a blow for anti-abortion forces.
Then came the Planned Parenthood ruling, in which the justices clearly outlined their views on
Roe. The decision (also 5-4) reaffirmed the heart of Roe while giving states the power to
regulate procedures so long as they did not impose an "undue burden" on a woman's right to
abortion. The standard: Undue burden exists if "the purpose and effect is to place substantial
obstacles in the path of a woman seeking an abortion before the fetus attains viability." The
ruling left supporters on both sides of the issue dissatisfied, feeling it was ambiguous.
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor did not join either opinion, saying there was nothing in it to justify
reconsidering Roe. Nevertheless, Blackmun wrote, "the right to reproductive choice" was in
danger of being overturned.
Another legacy of Roe that remains: The head-counting of justices on the court, a what-if
scenario that could lead to the overturning of Roe. The current 5-4 conservative majority could
shift significantly in either direction if two or more justices leave the bench in the next few years,
as is widely expected.
In the meantime, conservatives in Congress have promised to push for tougher restrictions on
the access to abortion, though many political experts say the goal is not necessarily aimed at
overturning Roe.
They found success last year when the justices in a sharply divided 5-4 ruling upheld a federal
ban on a controversial a late-term procedure, rejecting concerns the law didn't take into account
the physical safety of the mother.
The procedure is typically performed by doctors in the middle to late second trimester. The legal
sticking point was that the law lacked a "health exception" for a woman who might suffer serious
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medical complications, something the justices have said in the past is necessary when
considering abortion restrictions.
The swing vote, as in previous cases, came from Kennedy. In angry dissent, Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg, the lone woman on the high court since O'Connor stepped down, called the majority's
conclusions "alarming" and said they "cannot be understood as anything other than an effort to
chip away a right declared again and again by this court, and with increasing comprehension of
its centrality to women's lives."
If there is one last legacy of the Roe decision, it may be that it opened up and expanded the
entire debate on the rights of women, sexuality, health care, and medical decisions. Issues like
cloning, stem cells, and fetal research have become part of the national lexicon. As significant
as it was, Roe v. Wade was only the beginning of the battle.
___________________________________________________________________________
Abortion foes find new climate.(NEWS).Andrea Stone. USA Today (Jan 23,
2009): p.03A. (723 words) From Student Resource Center - Gold.
Full Text: COPYRIGHT 2009 USA Today
Byline: Andrea Stone
WASHINGTON -- Thousands of abortion opponents marched here Thursday on the anniversary
of Roe v. Wade, but for the first time in 14 years, they found themselves out of step with both the
president and the party controlling Congress.
On the 36th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision, Democrats control the White House
and Congress for the first time since 1995. That has given hope to abortion rights activists that
restrictions enacted by President Bush and his Republican allies will be reversed.
Bush routinely sent words of encouragement to the March for Life. President Obama issued a
statement saying he was "committed to protecting a woman's right to choose."
Obama said, "We are reminded that this decision not only protects women's health and
reproductive freedom, but stands for a broader principle: that government should not intrude on
our most private family matters."
Obama promised during his campaign to sign an executive order overturning a rule that denies
U.S. funding to international family-planning groups that provide abortion-related services or
information. He did not act on it Thursday.
"Some may see this brief delay as an 'olive branch' to the hundreds of thousands attending
today's March for Life," said Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, an advocacy group
for conservative positions. "If this is an olive branch, we'd like to see the olive tree."
"President Obama has demonstrated that he's a strong supporter of reproductive rights and that
he understands that the mere recognition of those rights isn't enough -- we must also ensure
access in order to improve the lives and health of women," said Nancy Northup of the Center for
Reproductive Rights, a legal advocacy group. "The new administration and Congress can take
action to not only reverse Bush's damaging policies, but advance policies that promote access
to reproductive health care and nominate federal judges who will guarantee protection of that
access."

Republican Rep. James Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin rallied the marchers. "For the past few
years, we pro-lifers have had it easy," he told marchers on the National Mall. "That's all
changed."
The former chairman of the House Judiciary Committee urged activists to work at the grass
roots. "It's not going to happen inside the Capital Beltway," he said.
Richard Hennessey, 72, a retired postal worker from Levittown, N.Y., agreed.
"We're all in a quandary. We don't know what (Obama's) going to do," he said, voicing fears that
late-term abortion restrictions and parental-notification laws would be reversed. The solution, he
said, was to follow the example of Obama's career. "We can be just like him," Hennessey said.
"We can be community activists for pro-life candidates."
As the protesters marched up Capitol Hill, they chanted a riff on Obama's campaign slogan:
"Save a life! Yes we can!" One carried a sign showing the new president with a Hitler mustache.
It said, "Impeach Adolf Obama." Another sign implored, "Please Mr. President: Reconsider."
A display of photos along the marchers' route included one of Obama surrounded by photos of
aborted fetuses.
"He's claiming to be a devout Christian, but how can he be when he is all for killing babies?"
asked Jim Brown, 58, of Loysville, Pa., as he led a group of high school students along the
exhibit, which also included a photo of a lynched black man.
Joan McCabe, 67, of Pittsburgh, recalled a remark Obama made last year, when he said he
would not want his daughters "punished with a baby" if they were to make the "mistake" of
becoming pregnant as teenagers. He later said he meant he wanted to prevent teen
pregnancies.
" 'They shouldn't be punished with a baby.' Those were his words," McCabe said. "I'm
concerned more women will wind up having abortions because of the law that he's willing to
change."
Many in the crowd, which included church groups, religious schools and Catholic clergy in nuns'
habits and monks' robes, said they would pray for Obama to have a change of heart.
After 20 anti-abortion marches, Patrick O'Donnell, 60, of Quakertown, Pa., says he still has
faith.
"There are probably more of us down here this year because of the fact that the president is
who he is," said O'Donnell. "It probably has energized those who are standing up for protection
of human life."
Source Citation: Stone, Andrea. "Abortion foes find new climate. (NEWS)." USA Today (Jan 23, 2009): 03A. Student
Resource Center - Gold. Gale. Etiwanda High School Library. 13 May 2009
<http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS>.

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