Title: The Supreme Court . Expanding Civil Rights . Landmark Cases . Roe v. Wade (1973) | PBS
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Content: At the time Roe was decided, most states severely restricted or banned the practice of abortion. However, these restrictions were challenged amid the sexual revolution and feminist movements of the 1960s. In 1970, two recent graduates of the University of Texas Law School, Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington, brought a lawsuit on behalf of a pregnant woman, Dallas area resident Norma L. McCorvey ("Jane Roe"), claiming a Texas law criminalizing most abortions violated Roe's constitutional rights. The Texas law banned all abortions except those necessary to save the life of the mother. Roe claimed that while her life was not endangered, she could not afford to travel out of state and had a right to terminate her pregnancy in a safe medical environment. The lawsuit was filed against Henry Wade, Dallas Country District Attorney, in a Texas federal court. The Texas court ruled that the law violated the Constitution. Wade appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which reviewed the case throughout 1971 and 1972. In a 7-2 decision written by Justice Harry Blackmun (who was chosen because of his prior experience as counsel to the Mayo Clinic), the Court ruled that the Texas statute violated Jane Roe's constitutional right to privacy. The Court argued that the Constitution's First, Fourth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments protect an individual's "zone of privacy" against state laws and cited past cases ruling that marriage, contraception, and child rearing are activities covered in this "zone of privacy."