The U.S. Supreme Court justices gather for an official picture at the court in Washington Sept. 29. Seated in the front row are, left to right, Justice Anthony Kennedy, Justice John Paul Stevens, Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Antonin Scalia, Justice Clarence Thomas, and in the back row are Justice Samuel Alito, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Justice Stephen Breyer and Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

WASHINGTON — A U.S. Supreme Court ruling last week was seen as encouraging for the pro-life movement in two ways.
Though the case had nothing to do with abortion, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission was a victory for organizations such as the National Right to Life Committee in that it affirmed the right to advertise on issues right before an election.

The ruling also contained a tantalizing nugget that reminded observers that precedents in the court’s history are not always cast in stone.

The Jan. 21 ruling struck down a provision of the McCain-Feingold Act limiting corporate political ads. The pro-life community has been buzzing with chatter that Citizens United might open a path to striking down Roe v. Wade, the 1973 case that found most restrictions against abortion unconstitutional.

In his concurring opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote about the possibility that a “precedent’s underlying reasoning” could “become so discredited that the court cannot keep the precedent alive without jury-rigging new and different justifications to shore up the original mistake.”

The opinion brought to mind Roberts’ 2005 Senate confirmation hearings, when he seemed to affirm Roe. “It’s settled as a precedent of the court, entitled to respect under principles of stare decisis,” he said at the time. “To avoid an arbitrary discretion in the judges, they need to be bound down by rules and precedents. ... I do think that it is a jolt to the legal system when you overrule a precedent. Precedent plays an important role in promoting stability and evenhandedness.”

Stare decisis (from the Latin phrase Stare decisis et non quieta movere, “Maintain what has been decided and do not alter what has been established”) is a basic legal principle that prior applicable precedent usually must be followed even though the case, if considered anew, might be decided differently by the current justices. This principle is based on the assumption that certainty, predictability and stability in the law are major objectives of the legal system, because parties should be able to regulate their conduct and enter into relationships with reasonable assurance of the governing rules of law.

Though his opinion in Citizens United seemed to suggest that judges need not necessarily be “bound down by rules and precedents,” should a challenge to Roe someday reach the high court, some prominent pro-life legal experts said it is still highly unlikely the comments could open a path to Roe’s demise in the near future.

“I don’t think there is anything here that gives us any signal about any imminent overruling of Roe v. Wade,” said Hadley Arkes, a professor of jurisprudence at Amherst College in Massachusetts.
The court was considering a case involving a conservative nonprofit corporation, Citizens United, that wanted to promote its film Hillary: The Movie, critical of then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, before the 2008 Democratic primaries. But the Federal Election Commission declared it “electioneering communication,” making it subject to restrictions of McCain-Feingold. These restrictions prohibit for-profit and nonprofit corporations from broadcasting speech that advocates the election or defeat of a candidate within 30 days of a primary election and 60 days before the general election.

In essence, what the court ruled was that the government could not regulate political speech, thus preserving the First Amendment’s free speech principle.

‘Don’t Hold Your Breath’
But other comments by Roberts also inspired hope that some on the court might consider overruling a past court decision, such as Roe. “This case is another example where the court overrules itself when the court realizes it made a mistake,” said Deirdre McQuade, spokeswoman for the Pro-Life Secretariat for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. “We know that Roe was a mistake and hope and pray that the court will recognize that as soon as possible.”

In his written comments endorsing the five-justice majority, Roberts rebutted Justice John Paul Stevens’ comments that the majority’s opinion was not “serious about judicial restraint.” Roberts also made clear that the court’s majority was not disrespecting the court’s past decisions in also overruling several other federal and state laws that have been on the books for more than 50 years. “This approach is based on a false premise: that our practice of avoiding unnecessary (and unnecessarily broad) constitutional holdings somehow trumps our obligation faithfully to interpret the law,” Roberts wrote. “It should go without saying, however, that we cannot embrace a narrow ground of decision simply because it is narrow; it must also be right.”

He added that stare decisis cannot be seen as “an inexorable command” because, in references to past court decisions, “if it were, segregation would be legal, minimum wage laws would be unconstitutional and the government could wiretap ordinary criminal suspects without first obtaining warrants.” Charles Rice, professor emeritus of law at Notre Dame Law School, said the basic principle at stake in truly overruling Roe is for a majority of justices to view the unborn child as a person. But that is not the case now, he added.

“Everyone is excited about Roberts’ opinion,” Rice said. “I don’t think it means anything in terms of really eliminating abortion, unless you’re talking about restoring personhood to the unborn child. And one practical reason for that is that the abortion of the future and increasingly of the present is the early abortion, which legally isn’t treated as an abortion but as contraception — what we call emergency contraception, which is really abortion.” He referred to the idea of the court one day overturning Roe as “a fool’s paradise” because the matter of abortion will then be up to each of the states to regulate. So abortion would then be still legal in those states that sanction it. In other words, what is needed is for the Supreme Court to decide if the unborn child is a person, he said.

“Don’t hold your breath waiting for that,” Rice said. But having the matter in the hands of the states — as opposed to it being the law of the land, as it is right now — is better than the situation now, said Helen Alvare, an associate professor of law at George Mason University in Arlington, Va.

“I would rather be in a situation where we at least have a chance to win in some places than a situation where we’re banned from winning,” she said, adding that better technology, such as ultrasound, and advances in genetics have made it easier for pro-lifers to make the case that the unborn child is a person.

Meanwhile, abortion activists have been using Roberts’ comments to raise awareness that the court might be on the path to overturning Roe, which Alvare viewed as the pro-abortion advocates’ way of rallying the base and raising money for their cause. The Register tried unsuccessfully to get a comment from the Center for Reproductive Rights.

The group’s Nancy Northup said last week: “Yesterday’s Roberts court decision, which exhibited a stunning disregard for settled law of decades’ standing, is terrifying to those of us who care deeply about the constitutional protections the court put in place for women’s access to abortion.”

The law at the heart of the recent court case, the McCain-Feingold Act, which was passed in 2002, has been in the crosshairs of nonprofit groups such as National Right to Life, which considered the law to be unconstitutional. “It’s a tremendous victory for free speech and a victory for the pro-life movement,” said David O’Steen, executive director of National Right to Life. “All pro-life groups were affected by these prohibitions of speech, and I think it will benefit the pro-life movement, and it will benefit the American political process.” He mentioned how the National Right to Life Committee’s daily radio program, “Pro-life Perspective,” could not mention Barack Obama’s name on the air in the 60 days leading up to the 2008 presidential election since such activity was banned to nonprofit corporations as “electioneering communication” at the time under McCain-Feingold.

“We couldn’t even say, ‘Here is his position on abortion, or here is what he said about abortion,’” O’Steen said. “This frees us to speak.”

Prayer to End Abortion

Lord God, I thank you today for the gift of my life,
And for the lives of all my brothers and sisters.

I know there is nothing that destroys more life than abortion,
Yet I rejoice that you have conquered death
by the Resurrection of Your Son.

I am ready to do my part in ending abortion.
Today I commit myself
Never to be silent,
Never to be passive,
Never to be forgetful of the unborn.

I commit myself to be active in the pro-life movement,
And never to stop defending life
Until all my brothers and sisters are protected,
And our nation once again becomes
A nation with liberty and justice
Not just for some, but for all.

Through Christ our Lord. Amen!

She went to the Red Mass,slipped in almost late.Someone’s friend was there and sat some seats from Biden.Pray for Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Kennedy.Someone’s friend asked for this now.NOW.

we need places where women can go for their pregnancies -- paid for by the government -- up until they deliver if necessary

Any woman afraid that she would not be able to bring her pregnancy to term for financial reasons should find the Catholic diocese in the phone book. She will be taken care of, and no government funds will be used.

That is VERY good to know, but the information really needs to be out there for the impoverished mother, because I don't know that it is. Those trying to help at the clinics proper are now kept so far away in the "bubble zones," etc., and I honestly myself did not know what you are saying is true, so how would they? I've seen bumper stickers with numbers on where to call for help, but none of them say explicitly to call such and such a number if you cannot pay to bring your baby to term because we will see to it that you can, and I think those should be out there. It needs to be more clearly spelled out. Also, if you are sick and feel you can't bring your baby to term, call us and we will help you. Moms that abort oftentimes are looking for a hand extended, and I'd much rather have my tax dollar (if there's not enough to go around through the Catholic Church) going to help them deliver their child, than to abort their child, which is only the devil's work.

I would like to know WHY the decrease? It does not seem to be correlated with Roe V Wade. I would think it may have to do with either population and the ages of women. Or more hopefully the impact that scientific information on pregnancy/conception and the increasing discussion of the pro-life movement is having an impact. We may want to find out why the decrease to put our efforts into the areas that impact people the most.

What else the average American didn't see in the MSM's non-coverage of the March for Life was the huge number of teenagers and young adults. I recently saw a poll showing that young people were more pro-life than their boomer parents; what specifically is driving their pro-life views I don't know, but continued efforts in the direction of youthful Americans seem likely to be very effective.

“Ruling based on precedent is a slippery slope. Do they ever actually look at the Constitution anymore?”

Legally speaking, THIS is a major part of the problem. Consider Mr. Obama who sees the Constitution as a flawed document...along with a plethora of lawyers who all use PRECEDENT more than the actual document of the Constitution.

We need far better schools of law in this nation!

“We need far better schools of law in this nation!”

On Beck he covered where this practice originated. It was a Harvard Law School professor who was part of the original progressive movement in the 1920s. He had great disdain for the Constitution because of its limiting factor.

IF these stats are correct, I wonder if this could be correlated to the increasing opposition of the American people to the slaughter of unborn babies?

Science and technology increasingly reveal the truth regarding human development in the womb.

That would make sense...as the Progressive Movement has always been based on the idea that MAN can build Utopia...so to speak. The basic foundational philosophy of the “Progressive” is terribly erroneous. Most people with common sense can OBSERVE the error of such thinking.

IF these stats are correct, I wonder if this could be correlated to the increasing opposition of the American people to the slaughter of unborn babies?

Science and technology increasingly reveal the truth regarding human development in the womb.

It may be.

The pro life movement might do well to shift to a push for more education on conception and pregnancy,using technology. IF that is what is motivating women to avoid abortion, then we should stay away from the “scairy’ reality pictures of abortion and the “demonstrations” at abortion clinics....handing out videos and pictures on the baby in the womb and creating a “positive, enlightening and educational experience”,
We want to have perhaps an alternative, compassionate “welcoming “ approach to our message to pregnant women.

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