By GREG MARKLEY
OPINION ––
It was November 1977, four years after the controversial Roe v. Wade decision of the Supreme Court. That landmark decision essentially legalized abortions in the U.S. woman could have an abortion based on the right to privacy in the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Three weeks ago, after 50 years, the court ruled there was no longer a constitutional right to an abortion.
That decision, Dobbs v. Jackson (MS) Women’s Health Organization, brought joy to pro-lifers and angst to pro-choicers. It reminded me of the feud the issue brought to the college newspaper in Rhode Island where I was the assistant editor. Bill Baird, a fiery reproductive rights pioneer, was set to speak.
He was called the “father” of the birth control and abortion-rights movement. He was jailed eight times in the 1960s for lecturing on abortion and birth control. Our editor put an announcement of Baird’s visit on page 7 or 8 of the Rhode Island College Anchor.
This was despite the fact Baird was well-known and merited better coverage. His talk was O.K. in attendance but not as well-attended as some would like. For example, our main copy editor was vehemently pro-choice, and she harangued him about “hiding Baird’s visit because of your own views.”
Steve, the editor in-chief, had six brothers and sisters. His father was a geography professor at the college and his mother was chairwoman of the state’s largest pro-life organization. I sometimes ate dinner with them at their long dinner table, but I didn’t have a fully formed opinion on Roe v. Wade and the ancillary issues such as protecting the woman’s health and abortions after a rape.
We had a staff meeting where Steve was voted out for using his power to weaken coverage for a speaker he morally opposed. This was sad because I was a friend of his. Yet, his misusing his influence in that case disturbed me as a budding journalist. Steve left the newspaper and I didn’t see him on campus for a month. But we eventually made amends.
I was ambitious, but getting the top editor job was a consequence of his error in judgment, not part of a scheme of mine. Let’s forward to 2022. In anticipation of the Dobbs decision, after the famous leak with intriguing details, The Economist explained that the justices face a crisis of legitimacy.
“The Supreme Court lacks an Army; it relies on others to give life to its decisions,” the newspaper said. “So far, whenever the court’s legitimacy has been questioned, it’s authority has held. Yet the justices would surely like their judgments to inspire more than acquiescence. And it does not seem implausible that grudging acceptance might at some point devolve into defiance.”
The article notes that legendary Associate Justice Robert Jackson, who served from 1945 to 1954, was concerned that a favorable perception of the court’s legitimacy was essential.
“We are not final because we are infallible,” he said. “We are infallible only because we are final.”
While living in Texas in the early 1980s, after a Bible Study, a church member said she had to tell us something important. Myself, another man and a second woman from class heard the speaker describe her having had an abortion choice. She was worried that if we found out, we would banish her from the church.
I said, “Of course not. We are all in this tough world together.” The others agreed and we all hugged the woman. Here in July 2022, a disappointment to me as Dobbs was being decided was the leak from Associate Justice Samuel Alito’s chambers. Observers said it was likely a liberal trying to stir things up before the announcement. But I suspect a conservative might have done the leaking. Why?
Because anti-Roe justices might have been afraid that the relatively moderate Chief Justice John Roberts might tamper down the final decision. He has done that before and has been praised for doing it. The Wall Street Journal reported that originalism played a role in Dobbs.
“This isn’t a partisan Court looking for preferred policy outcomes,” according to the WSJ. “It’s a Court that hews to the tenets of originalism, with different shades of emphasis by different justices. The Court’s jurisprudence is focused more than anything else on who under the Constitution gets to decide policy, not what that policy should be.”
In the movie “Breach”, a young FBI agent asks senior agent Robert Hannsen (a Russian spy) why he never sought personal publicity.
“I am in this career not for making headlines, but making history,” he said. Abortion rights activist Bill Baird, whose visit to my undergraduate college in 1977 led to my elevation to newspaper editor-in-chief, is 90 years old. He must be angry the way things turned out — with Roe v. Wade relegated to history.
Greg Markley moved to Lee County in 1996. He has masters degrees in education and history. He taught politics as an adjunct in Georgia and Alabama. An award-winning writer in the Army and civilian life, he has contributed to the Observer for 14 years. He is a member of the national Education Writers Association (focus on Higher Education).