Opponents of abortion rights have tried to claim a major victory, latching onto the announcement that the woman whose case was the basis for the landmark decision legalizing abortion in 1973 had changed her views. But a sober look at the facts shows these opponents, and especially the rightist groups who have tried to shut down clinics, have lost ground.
While attacks on abortion rights have come from Democratic and Republican party politicians at the state and federal levels, as well as a range of rightists who get wind in their sails from their actions, antiabortion forces have not succeeded in dealing a decisive blow to the right codified in the Roe v. Wade decision.
It was neither the action of the men on the Supreme Court at the time, nor the efforts of capitalist politicians that won women the right to choose. The 1973 ruling was the result of years of struggle. It was the product of debates and demonstrations that forced open a public discussion and won the majority to the view that controlling your own body is a fundamental right.
Thousands of women who took to the streets, coming on top of a rise in social struggles for Black rights and against the U.S. government's war in Vietnam, compelled those in power to legalize what women had won through struggle.
The unrelenting campaign to try to reverse this gain was begun as soon as the law was passed, and there have been some serious limits placed on access to abortion. But legal abortion remains the law of the land.
Just as abortion rights were won, the key to defending them remains the active, mobilized response by workers, youth, and others willing to stand up and fight back. The rightist organizations who have bombed, shot at, and blockaded clinics have been thwarted in their campaign by the effectiveness of the mobilizations in defense of abortion rights. Over-confident boasting on the part of the anti-choice forces is aimed at accomplishing through hype what they have failed to achieve in fact.