The Woman Behind Roe vs. Wade (and what I didn’t know)

(1) The name “Jane Roe” was created over beer and pizza.Show more

In 1969, Norma was 21 years old, divorced, and pregnant for the third time. (The first two children were placed for adoption.) After seeking an abortion but finding out it was illegal, and then driving to an illegal clinic only to find it closed, adoption attorney Henry McCluskey referred her to two young lawyers in Dallas, Sarah Weddington and Linda Coffee. Weddington (who had traveled to Mexico a couple of years earlier to have an abortion) was seeking a class-action lawsuit against the state of Texas in order to legalize abortion. It was an unlikely party at the corner booth of Columbo’s pizza parlor in Dallas: two recent law-school grads in business suits sitting across the table from a rough and uneducated homeless woman. The lawyers needed a representative for all women seeking abortions—one who was young, poor, and white. They just didn’t want her to cross state lines to get a legal abortion, or the case would be considered moot and dismissed. Without money and five months pregnant, Norma was the ideal candidate. After downing several pitchers of beer, they agreed on using the pseudonym “Jane Roe.”

(2) Jane Roe didn’t know the meaning of “abortion.”

(3) Jane Roe never appeared in court.

(4) Jane Roe never had an abortion.

(5) Jane Roe became pro-life.

See more...here
https://deeprootsathome.com/the-woman-behind-roe-vs-wade-and-what-i-didnt-know/