Answer:
The 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade was far from radical—it was the logical extension of Supreme Court decisions on the right to privacy dating back to the turn of the century and used the same reasoning that guarantees our right to refuse medical treatment and the freedom to resist government search and seizure. In finding that the constitutional right to privacy encompasses a woman’s right to choose whether or not to continue a pregnancy, the Supreme Court continued a long line of decisions that rejected government interference in life’s most personal decisions. What follows is an outline of selected Supreme Court decisions showing how the Court’s views on abortion and the right to privacy have evolved. May 25, 1891, Union Pacific Railway Co. v. The Supreme Court rejected the right of a defendant in a civil action to compel the plaintiff to submit to physical examination, writing that “No right is held more sacred, or is more carefully guarded, by the common law, than the right of every individual to the possession and control of his own person, free from all restraint or interference of others ….”June 4, 1928, v. United States: In a wiretapping case, Justice Brandeis, dissenting, wrote broadly of the right to be “let alone”: