Ramesh Ponnuru, Columnist

Pro-Lifers Needn't Fear a Post-Roe Abortion-Rights Backlash

Liberals have few ways to fight back effectively if the Supreme Court overturns its landmark 1973 decision.

May 21, 2021 at 11:00 AM UTC

Ramesh Ponnuru is a former Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is the editor of National Review and a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

The landscape has shifted.
Photographer: Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images

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For the first time since 1992, the end of Roe v. Wade is a real possibility. Back then, the Supreme Court defied widespread expectations by sticking with the 1973 ruling’s core holding that legislatures could not prohibit abortion. A lot of Republican politicians were relieved because they thought that a reversal by the court would have caused a political backlash. (They lost the next election anyway.)

The circumstances are different now, as a Supreme Court with six Republican-appointed justices takes up a case about Mississippi’s ban on abortion after 15 weeks. If the conservative justices think that Roe should go, they could hardly have found a more propitious time from the perspective of the pro-life movement.