When Will Prolifers Wise Up?

In our New Oxford Notes (Sept., pp. 15-16, 18; Oct., pp. 12-13), we told you that Judge John Roberts, appointed by President Bush for the Supreme Court (and now for Chief Justice), would not overturn Roe v. Wade. We wrote those Notes before Roberts appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Roberts has now come before the Senate Judiciary Committee, and if any of our readers had any doubts about what we had to say, they can quietly lay them to rest.

We had quoted Roberts when he came before the Senate Judiciary Committee for his appointment to the Court of Appeals on April 30, 2003. Roberts said: “Roe vs. Wade is the settled law of the land…. There’s nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent….” Sen. Arlen Specter asked Roberts at the Judiciary Committee hearings for his appointment for Chief Justice (Sept. 13, 2005): “Do you mean settled for you, settled only for your capacity as a circuit judge, or settled beyond that?” Roberts answered: “Well, beyond that.” That means that Roe is settled law, not just for Roberts himself, not just for Roberts as a circuit judge, but is settled for him as a Supreme Court justice.

Then Specter said: “Your final statement as to this quotation: ‘There is nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent [Roe], as well as Casey [which upheld Roe].’ There have been questions raised about your personal views…. When you talk about your personal views and, as they may relate to your own faith, would you say that your views are the same as those expressed by John Kennedy when he was a candidate, when he spoke to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association in September of 1960, ‘I do not speak for my church on public matters and the church does not speak for me’?” Roberts responded: “I agree with that, Senator. Yes.”