May 4, 2022 5 min read

Pennsylvania lawmakers and advocates on both sides of the abortion issue reacted Tuesday to a U.S. Supreme Court draft opinion that shows it is set to overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision legalizing abortion nationwide.

If the court throws out Roe v. Wade, individual states will be allowed to ban abortion.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pennsylvania, said in a statement, “If this draft opinion becomes the final opinion of the court, I have serious concerns about what overturning almost 50 years of legal precedent will mean for women in states passing near or total bans on abortion. Congress should be working to reduce the number of abortions and unintended pregnancies and doing much more to support women and families.”

Marjorie Becker, former executive director of Lifeline of Southwest PA, who serves on its board of directors and volunteers, welcomed the news about the Supreme Court’s draft document.

“My response is, I did not agree with the original Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade almost 50 years ago, when I realized they were destroying the lives of unborn babies under the guise of the right to privacy, without considering the rights of the unborn child,” said Becker.

Becker said her nonprofit has been preparing for a future where Roe v. Wade was struck down.

“If this goes through, and we don’t know what wording the Supreme Court ultimately will come up with, we have to provide all of the support we can to women, and all of our efforts should go into that,” said Becker. “We started Lifeline to give support to women who had nowhere to turn. Women deserve better than the death of a child.”

Susan Frietsche, senior staff attorney at Women’s Law Project’s Western Pennsylvania office, is among abortion-rights advocates who expressed dismay at the court’s potential ruling and pledged to work to uphold women’s reproductive rights.

“I’m outraged and saddened, for sure,” said Frietsche.”Our hearts go out to our colleagues and friends in the states that are expected to criminalize abortion after an opinion is actually issued.”

Bruce Antkowiak, a law professor at St. Vincent College, said a leak of potential Supreme Court opinion is unprecedented in his recollection.

“This represents a very, very serious breach of judicial practice,” he said. “It’s the sort of thing that is unjustified, regardless of one’s view of any particular subject matter. The Supreme Court is an intensely deliberative body. The opinions are produced over a considerable period of time with a great deal of back and forth among the members of the bench given the opportunity to influence, comment upon. The preemptive release of this creates deeply troubling concerns about that process.”

Dr. Joseph DiSarro, professor of political science at Washington & Jefferson College, said he has taught constitutional law for 45 years and cannot remember a leak of this nature concerning a major decision.

“This would create political havoc,” he said of the potential reversal of the decision, which, according to the leaked information, is a 5-4 vote. “It would hurt the legitimacy of the court. This is just one vote. To overturn such a precedent by just one vote, I think is very, very bad policy by the court. It would be viewed as a self-inflicted wound.”

DiSarro said that potential reversal would create havoc for the Republican Party in the mid-term election.

“I can’t be sure about this, but I think it would change the outcome of the mid-terms,” he said. “It would simply change the political conversation from the economy, energy, farm policy to Roe v. Wade.”

A May 2021 Pew Research study showed a 59% majority of U.S. adults say abortion should be legal in all or most cases, while 39% think abortion should be illegal in all or most cases.

U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pennsylvania, who called the leak of the opinion a “gross breach in Court procedure,” said, “I’m concerned it was released as a political ploy to pressure Justices to change their views when the rule of law – not public opinion – should determine the outcome and reasoning of a case.”

At least 13 states have already passed so-called “trigger laws” that will automatically ban abortions if Roe is overturned, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a group that advocates for abortion protections. Several other states likely would pass abortion laws quickly.

Meanwhile, another 15 states, including Pennsylvania, have laws protecting abortion rights.

However, Pennsylvania Senate Bill 956 seeks to amend the state constitution to declare that people in Pennsylvania do not have the constitutional right to abortion. If Roe v. Wade is overruled in the next few months and SB 956 is subsequently adopted, abortion could be criminalized in Pennsylvania.

Frietsche noted that the draft opinion does not represent a final decision, and it is still possible for women to get an abortion in Pennsylvania.

“I want people to know abortion is still legal in Pennsylvania, and our clinics are still open, and it is still safe,” said Frietsche.

She continued, “We are not powerless, and we have the ability to fight back against the wave of criminalization of abortion. Now is the time for everybody who cares about women’s lives to stand up for them and to be heard really loud and clear, and say that we are not going to allow this to happen in our country.”