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McCorvey petitions to reverse Roe

Norma McCorvey, the woman in the eye of the abortion storm, has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to take her case and reverse Roe v. Wade, or at least order a trial on the merits.

“I joined with the Texas Justice Foundation about five years ago to overturn Roe v. Wade,” Miss McCorvey, the “Jane Roe” of Roe v. Wade, explained at the March for Life Conference in Washington, D.C., January 23.

“I realized that Norma had the right to reopen Roe v. Wade on the grounds that it’s no longer just,” Allan Parker, president of the Justice Foundation and lead attorney in the case, told the conference.

Under Rule 60 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, a plaintiff is allowed to appeal a court decision in his case when conditions have changed making the decision no longer equitable.

McCorvey contends that since the original judgment in Roe in 1973, there have been significant changes in the factual conditions surrounding abortion which demonstrate that abortion hurts women.

On behalf of McCorvey, the Justice Foundation, a non-profit, public interest law firm, filed a Rule 60 Motion with the U.S. District Court in Dallas in June 2003.

The court denied the motion in two days.

“The judge read over five thousand pages of documentation in 48 hours,” McCorvey observed cynically.

The case was appealed in October 2003 to the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.  A three-judge panel dismissed the appeal a month later.

One of the three judges, Edith Jones, however, wrote a concurring opinion, stating that she hoped the Supreme Court would acknowledge the developments since 1973 and re-evaluate Roe accordingly.

The same court in October 2004 denied the petition for rehearing en banc without opinion.

On January 14 the Justice Foundation filed a petition for a Writ of Certiorari, asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take the case.

A major legal argument made in the petition is that when an important area of social responsibility is constitutionalized, affecting the health of millions of women and effectively withdrawing it from the legislative arena and lower courts, the Supreme Court has a special duty to monitor substantially changed conditions to ensure justice and protect women’s health.

The petition includes over a thousand Friend of the Court briefs, which include sworn testimony by women who suffered from abortions.

“There are two lies about abortion,” noted Parker:  “first, that it’s not a baby, and second, that abortion helps women.  The way you counter the latter is with testimony from women.”

The petition states, “Since the original judgment in Roe v. Wade, factual conditions surrounding abortion have changed significantly, demonstrating that abortion hurts women.

“Evidence of those changed factual conditions includes:  the testimony of women harmed by abortion; medical studies documenting abortion injuries; an explosion of knowledge since 1973 concerning the effects of abortion on women; and the fact that abortion clinics do not provide the normal doctor-patient relationship anticipated by Roe.”

The petition also notes that since Roe, 46 states have passed “Baby Moses” or “safe haven” laws, allowing a woman to leave her “unwanted” baby at a hospital or clinic with no questions asked, thus removing the need for abortion to avoid any “unwanted” burdens of motherhood.

“Everything is going well,” said McCorvey.  “The briefs are in, the justices will review the case.  We are waiting to hear; but the wheels of justice turn very slowly.”

“We do the process – God does the work,” said Parker.

He asked pro-lifers at the conference to pray for a good outcome, adding, “It’s in the hands of the Court and God.”