The title says it all. Please, I don’t want to debate whether abortion is right or not.
Seems to me, the next President may well be nominating one or more new members of the US Supreme Court. As it is right now, Roe v. Wade endures by a 5-4 majority. The next Justice will make or break that majority.
What is likely to happen? If Kerry is elected, I expect him to nominate pro-choice judges. Bush, the opposite. Harsh battles in Congress will ensue either way. Everyone could get “Borked”.
How is this likely to play out, in either eventuality?
Easy, inexpensive and safe chemical abortions (i.e some descendant of RU486) ultimately render the entire issue of a legal ban moot.
It was expected that Justice Sandra Day O’Connor would retire during the current Presidential term, and in fact one of the major differences between Bush’s election platform and Gore’s was that he would appoint a Justice who would “overturn Roe v. Wade”.
Of course, presidential candidates should certainly not run on the basis of judges they’ll be appointing, but <sigh> he did anyway. I believe Justice O’Connor chose not to retire largely because she does not want to see Roe overturned.
Rehnquist might retire during the next term, but since he’s anti-abortion it wouldn’t make much difference.