Justice O’Connor, joined by Justice Rehnquist, prefaced her dissent with the following words:
“This Court’s abortion decisions have already worked a major distortion in the Court’s constitutional jurisprudence…Today’s decision goes further, and makes it painfully clear that no legal rule or doctrine is safe from nullification by this Court when an occasion for its application arises in a case involving state regulation of abortion.”
In 1973, the pro-abortion vote on the United States Supreme Court was 7 to 2. In 1983, Justice Sandra O’Connor made it 6-3.
In 1986 Chief Justice Burger made it 5-4. Although Burger is retiring he is being replaced by a pro-life judge. One more vote and it will be 4-5 and Roe v. Wade can be overturned.
