U.S. Supreme Court's decision on abortion

ROE vs. WADE

Date Decided: January 22, 1973
Chief Justice Presiding: Warren E. Burger
Vote Split: 7-2.

Roe v. Wade is considered as one of the most controversial cases in the United States. This became a battle between an unborn child's right to life and a woman's right to choose.

In the early 1970s, Norma McCorvey, a single mother living in Texas, was pregnant for a third time, McCorvey decided she did not want to bear a third child, but Texas state law prevented her from having an abortion. After almost three years, the U.S. Supreme Court finally released its decision on the case asserting that the constitutional right to privacy extends to a decision of a woman to have an abortion. In effect, this court ruling legalized first trimester abortion. A woman's choice to have an abortion within her first trimester of pregnancy is still within her constitutional right.