The Long Road And Significance Of Overturning Roe

The Significance of the Overturning of Roe

Remember where you were on the morning of Friday, June 24, 2022, a few minutes past 10:00 AM, EST. History was made this morning. The seemingly impossible happened. At last, the Supreme Court of the United States overturned Roe v. Wade.

To be sure, this is just the beginning of a new battle to be fought for the unborn, state by state, life by life, heart by heart. But this is also a massive, unprecedented victory, one that, for many years, seemed completely out of reach.

After all, Roe became law in 1973, almost 50 years ago. In many ways, American values have become much less conservative since then.

To give just one example, the Brookings Institute revealed back in 1996 that, “​​We have found that this rather sudden increase in the availability of both abortion and contraception we call it a reproductive technology shock is deeply implicated in the increase in out-of-wedlock births.”

The Brookings Institute further reported that, “Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families.”

This is a staggering increase.

By 2016, according to the research institution Child Trends, “28 percent of all births to non-Hispanic white women (i.e., white) occurred outside of marriage, a figure that is almost twice as high as the 15 percent of births among this demographic that were nonmarital in 1990. In 2016, 52 percent of all births to Hispanic women occurred outside of marriage, up from 34 percent in 1990 (a more than 50 percent increase). The percent of births that occurred outside of marriage also increased for non-Hispanic black women (black) between 1990 and 2016, from 63 to 69 percent (a nine percent increase).”

Not only has illegitimacy increased substantially, but marriage itself has been redefined by the Supreme Court, and for many conservative, family values, it seems as if the ship has sailed, especially with the Court actually taking Roe further in the 1992 Casey case when it should have done the exact opposite.

The battle for abortion in America has been lost, forever – at least, that’s how it seemed.

Whole generations of women have been born into a pro-abortion culture, to the point that it is not just an accepted moral right. It has also become a sacred rite.

But pro-lifers – both Catholic and Protestant – never gave up the battle, and for a number of different reasons, the number of abortions has been steadily declining, almost without exception, from the late 1990s until today.

And now, at last, Roe has been overturned.

The Court could easily have upheld the Mississippi law without overturning Roe, an approach which would have still had the effect of chipping away at the 1973 decision. It also would have been more likely to entice Chief Justice Roberts into joining a clean 6-3 majority decision. Instead, Roberts wrote an opinion concurring with the Dobbs decision but, dissented on overturning Roe. (See here for the official ruling.)

Instead, it went one step further, exposing Roe for the travesty it is. And to think – just a few years ago, this decision still seemed impossible.

It was only because President Trump (an unlikely hero in the pro-life battle) was able to appoint three new justices to the Court, all of whom voted the right way. This decision only became possible after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the quick approval of Justice Amy Coney Barrett in Trump’s last months in office.

Talk about a series of unexpected events – with the narcissistic, bullheaded, former pro-abortion playboy playing a central role.

Now, states can pass their pro-life laws without restriction. Now, the murderous, angry spirit of abortion will be further exposed, as violent mobs will attack pro-life centers and pro-life people, and as other states will pass more extreme, pro-abortion laws. This has already happened in New York, Maryland, and California.

May the light shine all the more clearly in the midst of the darkness.

May love overcome hatred.

May the Lord make a separation between those who choose life and those who choose death.

And may the Church rise up and make an even more compelling case for the humanity of the baby in the womb, also offering even more compassionate care and hope to expectant moms and dads who are contemplating abortion. May life prevail!

It is true that the overturning of Roe is decades late, which means tens of millions of slaughtered babies were allowed to perish. It is true that there is much blood guilt on our hands.

But it is also true that only in America has a pro-life movement pushed back with such tenacity for so many years. What has

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