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The Abortion Decision

'Betrayal' or 'Courage': 3 Justices Are Judged

Decision: O'Connor, Kennedy and Souter take the middle ground, and

some heat, in break from the right.

June 30, 1992|ROBERT L. JACKSON, TIMES STAFF WRITER 

WASHINGTON ² Supreme Court Justices Sandra Day O'Connor, Anthony M. Kennedy

and David H. Souter were reviled Monday by Randy Terry, chairman of the Operation

Rescue anti-abortion group, for their cowardice and betrayal, but fellow Justice Harry A.

Blackmun lauded them for "an act of personal courage and constitutional principle."

O'Connor, Kennedy and Souter had rejected pleas by the Bush Administration and other anti-

abortion advocates to overturn the 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision when they ruled in Monday's

decision on a Pennsylvania abortion case. Instead the three laid down a middle-ground

approach to the bitterly divisive issue that preserves the right to abortion but permits the

states to regulate it.

O'Connor and Kennedy are appointees of former President Ronald Reagan, who was as

vociferous in his opposition to abortion as has been President Bush, who named Souter to the

court.

And while the conservative philosophy of the three was clear in Monday's decision on a

Pennsylvania law setting preconditions for abortion, the majority opinion they helped write

surprised some by its independent conclusions and its repeated affirmations of what it

described as the basic principles of the 1973 decision.

Terry, whose group has attempted to block entrances to abortion clinics, was especially

angered by what he saw as a defection of the three justices. "Kennedy, Souter and O'Connor 

should be ashamed of their cowardice and their betrayal of the children and of justice," he

exclaimed after the vote.

But Blackmun, who authored the 1973 Roe decision, was effusive in his praise: "Make no

mistake, the joint opinion of Justices O'Connor, Kennedy and Souter is an act of personal

courage and constitutional principle," he wrote in his concurring opinion.

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Monday's ruling offered new insight into the thinking of the three justices who have emerged

as the decisive swing votes on one of the most contentious issues to come before the court in

modern times. Though a Reagan appointee, O'Connor in her 11 years on the court had never 

suggested that she favored an outright overturning of the landmark decision. Neither had she

said that Roe should be affirmed.

So she broke new ground personally Monday in declaring, along with Justices Kennedy,

Souter, Blackmun and John Paul Stevens, that the 19-year-old decision is "a rule of law and a

component of liberty we cannot renounce."

SOURCE: http://articles.latimes.com/1992-06-30/news/mn-1303_1_abortion-decision