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Does the Supreme Court’s refusal to enjoin the latest Texas anti-abortion law (Whole Woman’s Health v. Jackson) foreshadow a reversal of Roe v. Wade or its complete evisceration in the Mississippi case (Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization) now pending before the Court? Probably. 

I was born and spent my early years in Massachusetts when abortions there were illegal, birth control was prohibited, and unmarried mothers were stigmatized. I remember stories about pregnant women sent ostensibly to visit relatives but really went to New York where abortions were legal. Those without means oftentimes resorted to self-induced abortions by using a coat hanger or other object causing serious injury and even death. The coat hanger became a symbol of “self abortions” for those women who went to desperate lengths to terminate a pregnancy because they lacked access to an abortion. 

Anti-abortion laws disproportionately affect minority and low income women. Abortion rights are about equality, restrictions on abortion are the latest in a long history of treating women as second-class citizens. 

Reversing Roe v. Wade won’t change the number of women who will seek abortions; it will just block their access to getting it safely. 

RBG, we need you.