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26  DOBBS v. JACKSON WOMEN’S HEALTH ORGANIZATION 

Opinion of the Court 

that a constitutional right to abortion was established when 
the  Fourteenth  Amendment  was  adopted,  but  they  have
found no support for the existence of an abortion right that
predates the latter part of the 20th century—no state con-
stitutional  provision,  no  statute,  no  judicial  decision,  no 
learned treatise.  The earliest sources called to our atten-
tion  are  a  few  district  court  and  state  court  decisions  de-
cided shortly before Roe and a small number of law review 
articles from the same time period.36 

A few of respondents’ amici muster historical arguments, 
but they are very weak.  The Solicitor General repeats Roe’s 
claim that it is “ ‘doubtful’ . . . ‘abortion was ever firmly es-
tablished as a common-law crime even with respect to the 
destruction  of  a  quick  fetus.’ ”    Brief  for  United  States  26 
(quoting Roe, 410 U. S., at 136).  But as we have seen, great 
common-law  authorities  like  Bracton,  Coke,  Hale,  and 
Blackstone all wrote that a post-quickening abortion was a
crime—and  a  serious  one  at  that.  Moreover,  Hale  and 
Blackstone (and many other authorities following them) as-
serted that even a pre-quickening abortion was “unlawful”
and that, as a result, an abortionist was guilty of murder if 
the woman died from the attempt.

Instead of following these authorities, Roe relied largely
on two articles by a pro-abortion advocate who claimed that
Coke had intentionally misstated the common law because
of  his  strong  anti-abortion  views.37    These  articles  have 

—————— 

36 See 410 U. S., at 154–155 (collecting cases decided between 1970 and 
1973); C. Means, The Phoenix of Abortional Freedom: Is a Penumbral or
Ninth-Amendment Right About To Arise From the Nineteenth-Century 
Legislative  Ashes  of  a  Fourteenth-Century  Common-Law  Liberty?  17
N. Y. L. Forum 335, 337–339 (1971) (Means II); C. Means, The Law of
New York Concerning Abortion and the Status of the Foetus, 1664–1968: 
A Case of Cessation of Constitutionality, 14 N. Y. L. Forum 411 (1968) 
(Means I); Lucas 730. 

37 See 410 U. S., at 136, n. 26 (citing Means II); 410 U. S., at 132–133, 

n. 21 (citing Means I).