Document Type
Essay
Publication Date
Fall 2013
Publication Information
3 Claremont Rev. Books, no. 4, Fall 2013, at 66.
Abstract
Under the leadership of Chief Justice Warren Burger, who joined it in 1969, the Supreme Court departed from the course taken during the 16-year tenure of his predecessor, Earl Warren. The Burger Court rolled back precedents in criminal procedure and obscenity, while stopping the drive to universalize welfare rights and equalize public schooling expenditures. Roe v. Wade (1973), on the other hand, extended the Warren Court's deepest commitments: sexual liberation, obviously; equality, with respect to both race and class; and even church-state separation, insofar as the Roe Justices identified opposition to abortion with Catholic dogma. These more or less "progressive" values were concisely expressed by retired Justice Tom Clark, in a law review article the Roe Court cited and upon which the Justices relied, according to their inter-chambers memoranda. Clark wrote, "We are in the midst of a worldwide movement to make ‘the pill' and abortion available in the slums as well as on Fifth Avenue."
Recommended Citation
Gerard V. Bradley,
Roe v. Wade at 40,
3 Claremont Rev. Books, no. 4, Fall 2013, at 66..
Available at:
https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/law_faculty_scholarship/1745
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