THE LAW 1973: An Approval for Abortion Roe V. Wade

An Approval for Abortion

Soon after her illegitimate son was born two years ago, “Jane Roe,” a divorced Dallas bar waitress, put him up for adoption. At almost the same time, “Mary Doe,” an Atlanta housewife, bore a child who was also promptly adopted. Both women had asked for abortions and, like thousands of others, they had been turned down. Unlike most of the others, though, Roe and Doe went to court to attack the state statutes that frustrated them. The resulting legal fights took too long for either woman to get any practical benefit. But last week they had the satisfaction of hearing the Supreme Court read their pseudonyms into the annals of constitutional law. By a surprising majority of 7 to 2, the court ruled that Roe and Doe had won one of the nation’s most fiercely fought legal battles. Thanks to the Texas waitress and the poverty-stricken Georgia housewife, every woman in the U.S. now has the same right to an abortion during the first six months of pregnancy as she has to any other minor surgery.