Judging Thomas: The Life and Times of Clarence Thomas.

Vol. 15 No.4 (April 2005), pp.340-349

JUDGING THOMAS: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF CLARENCE THOMAS, by Ken Foskett. New York: William Morrow/HarperCollins, 2004. Hardcover. 352pp. US$24.95 / CDN$38.95. ISBN: 0060527218. Trade Paper. 368pp. US$14.95 / CDN$20.95. ISBN: 0060527226.

Reviewed by Henry F. Carey, Department of Political Science, Georgia State University. Email: polhfc@langate.gsu.edu .

Justice Clarence Thomas has been an Associate member of the Court since his contentious but successful Senate confirmation in 1991, replacing Thurgood Marshall, the first African American to serve on the Court and the justice whom Thomas apparently reveres greatly. This might seem paradoxical, given their opposite ideologies. Their important similarities, in fact, become evident, if one learns about the importance Thomas holds for combating racism and for fighting for ideals on one’s own terms in one’s own way. Having been confirmed at a young age as the 106th Supreme Court justice, he potentially could serve one of the longest tenures and have as much influence as his predecessor, whom he apparently admires for his courage and steadfastness (similar to President Reagan’s espoused admiration of FDR). Although he likely has many years left to serve, his life history portrayed in Ken Foskett’s biography, JUDGING THOMAS, provides readers with plenty of material to analyze and judge the Justice.

To his critics, like columnist Maureen Dowd of THE NEW YORK TIMES, Thomas is “barking mad.” His defenders, like the WALL STREET JOURNAL, on the other hand, find his opinions “clear and well-reasoned, honor[ing] our constitutional traditions.” He is one of the more complicated and controversial figures in contemporary America and certainly in the history of the US Supreme Court. His October 1991, second US Senate confirmation hearings were observed by huge television audiences. In particular, the accusations of sexual harassment by a former subordinate, Anita Hill, were not only dramatic, but also led to subsequent development of US law in this substantive area.

Among defenders of Thomas, Scott Gerber (2002) has concluded that it is mistaken to combine the views of Justices Thomas and Antonin Scalia, even though that is conventional wisdom. Gerber calls Thomas a “liberal originalist” on civil rights and a “conservative originalist” on civil liberties and federalism. On the latter, Thomas rejects any idea of group rights and relies on the Declaration of Independence. Gerber finds Thomas to be a more consistent thinker than Scalia, who is more likely to justify a desired result with whatever logic is persuasive. Thomas, on the other hand, implicitly believes that the US Constitution’s framers were dedicated to the ends of the Declaration and therefore would have approved of their inclusion as goals in constitutional interpretation.

On the Court, he has joined Chief Justice [*341] William Rehnquist and other conservatives in reviving the federalism doctrine, finding that more powers ought to be redistributed from the central government to the states. He argues that the First Amendment’s establishment clause was not intended to deny a role to religion in public life, including the access of religious groups to public and government facilities. In his 6-3 majority opinion in GOOD NEWS BIBLE CLUB v. MILFORD, he wrote that a Christian youth group could meet after school hours in public-school facilities. He wrote a minority dissent against applying the Americans with Disabilities Act to Casey Martin, a disabled professional golfer whom the majority allowed to use a golf cart. He holds that there is no constitutional basis for abortion, criticizing the holding in ROE v. WADE as based on an imputed right to privacy not found in the Constitution.

Not all of his views are routinely conservative. For example, in DESERT PALACE v. COSTA, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in an opinion written by Justice Thomas that an employee does not need direct evidence of bias in order to bring a lawsuit against an employer. He argued that if Congress intended to require a standard of direct evidence, it would have said so. Justice Thomas said that Congress’ “failure to do so is significant, for Congress has been unequivocal when imposing heightened proof requirements in other circumstances.”

However, more typical of his perspective is his dissent in GRUTTER v. BOLLINGER, in which Thomas expressed opposition to affirmative action and the goal of diversity in university admissions. He quoted Frederick Douglass: “And if the Negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also . . . Let him alone . . . Your interference is doing him positive injury.” Thomas also asked why so much emphasis is placed on the interests of elites to gain education, rather than on the problems of the underclass.

Thomas was nominated to the US Supreme Court with relatively few qualifications, having served on the Washington, DC, Circuit Court of Appeals for only a year and one-half, despite the fact that President George Herbert Walker Bush called him the “most qualified person in the country for the position.” His famous reaction to the accusations by Hill and others was that he had been subjected to a “high-tech lynching.” Following this and other final statements, he was confirmed by a very close 52-48 vote. By contrast, Justice Antonin Scalia was confirmed 98-0, largely because he entered the Court prior to the escalated politics of post-Bork nominations. As Scalia himself has suggested, he would not have been confirmed in the current confirmation era. Indeed, a radical nominee could not be confirmed today unless she has no judicial record or could hide her positions during the process. Otherwise, presumably only moderates will get through.

Following the experience of the Bork and Thomas confirmation hearings, we can predict that future hearings will likely be ideologically polarized, particularly over issues that do not engender compromise, such as social issues like abortion and school prayer (unlike economic questions). In addition, the filibustering of judicial nominations by the Democrats during the Bush [*342] Administration, and the attendant controversy over Senate cloture rules in 2005, suggest that the Thomas hearings and Supreme Court judicial tenure have become even more important in US political history and contemporary politics.

Critics call Thomas’ jurisprudence rigid; defenders find them to be principled. His constitutional interpretations are based largely on “originalism,” the doctrine that any constitutional ambiguity should be viewed through the optic of the framers’ original intention. Critics contend that such original meaning is often unknowable. For example, some issues were of little importance during the founding era (abortion or public education), and some technologies that are very important today were non-existent (the internet). Critics also assert that originalism does not produce more consistent interpretations than other methodologies and that Thomas’ opposition to affirmative action is hypocritical, because he was the beneficiary of such programs in his earlier career. Defenders counter that his only obligation is to reach honest conclusions about the constitutionality of a questioned policy and wonder why a black justice should be singled out for more criticism than other opponents of affirmative action, such as Justice Scalia.

Finally, Justice Stephen Breyer and Thomas have had a rather heated set of exchanges on the relevance of foreign court decisions to US jurisprudence. Yet, it has been Scalia who has taken the lead in public debates against the views of Breyer and Justices Sandra Day O’Connor that foreign law can be instructive in their more eclectic approach to constitutional interpretation. (Scalia-Breyer Debates 2005) Thomas was in the minority in LAWRENCE v. TEXAS (2003), which declared a state sodomy law to be unconstitutional, and in which the majority cited decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. Justice Thomas rarely writes separate opinions, because he frequently votes with at least one other colleague. Thus, his reputation as a maverick is perhaps undeserved.

Commentators assume that Justice Thomas refers to textualism, strict constructionism, and originalism, as his preferred methods of analysis. However, he does not follow any one of these methods all the time, and may not use any of them occasionally. In fact, he has offered no clear indication of his jurisprudential approach. This may reflect inconsistency or perhaps the inherent limitations of labels. There can be, of course, judicial activism from either the left or the right, and originalism can be conceptualized as founded partly on the natural law of the Declaration of Independence, which would depart from a textualist approach to originalism which would emphasize the words of the Constitution. Justice Marshall advocated that judicial review should follow from the principles of natural law, a view which Thomas apparently shares to an extent as well because of his opposition to slavery, which was originally accepted and which Thomas would not have accepted, even prior to the Thirteenth Amendment. So, Thomas, unlike Scalia, is more a conservative eclectic than a consistent, originalist activist (even if both would argue that an originalist could not be a judicial activist). Ironically, the normally quiet Thomas in Court may have a better judicial temperament, or the appearance [*343] of one, than the sardonic Scalia.

Did Thomas become conservative, or much more conservative, as result of his second round of Anita-Hill related confirmation hearings? It is an interesting hypothesis suggestible from Ken Foskett’s biography, JUDGING THOMAS. More controversially, would Thomas have remained a moderate or a mainstream conservative had he not thought that he had undergone a “high-tech lynching?” Foskett writes that this outburst was out of character for Thomas in public tone, but not in his attitudes.

I would argue that this book provides the data for making the case that Thomas’ turn toward ultra-conservativism on the Supreme Court has been a characteristic response to perceived racial discrimination by asserting black capability and self-reliance, while rejecting traditional black orthodoxy. This fascinating book depicts a man prone to post-traumatic stress, based on a temperament of extreme reactions to the racially charged issues which have dominated his life, as well as from an austere, self-reliant upbringing for most of his youth. Yet, he has opted for a “white” establishment that his grandfather warned him not to rely upon. This is presumably because of his ambivalence about his grandfather, who was too harsh and hypocritical to be followed completely, as well as because of their estrangement in adulthood. Thomas’ pattern of extreme reaction, moving first to the left, then to the middle, then to the right, and finally to the extreme right, has sent him toward independently created directions. He has not yet changed again after nearly fifteen years on the Supreme Court, though one is tempted by his uncharacteristic intervention and outburst during oral arguments a few years ago in a case regarding the use of racially hateful speech, which conventional constitutional jurisprudence renders a protected, civil liberty.

JUDGING THOMAS makes no pretense to explain Thomas’ jurisprudential approaches, and this reviewer’s conclusions regarding potential influences of his people and occurrences in his earlier life were gleaned from reading the book. It is not an intellectual biography but a painstakingly brilliant depiction of his formative experiences. The book is fun to read because the reader can draw one’s own inferences about the causes of Thomas’ jurisprudence. Foskett took a year off from his job as an investigative reporter for the ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION to write the book, which expands upon three lengthy articles published several years earlier in the newspaper. That Foskett managed to interview Thomas for this book is an unusual achievement, because the Justice has generally refused to speak with the press, including Foskett himself in his earlier newspaper series. Those who know Thomas report that he has a prodigious memory and will talk for hours with friends. He feels that the news media made little attempt to portray his life accurately. He holds great resentment toward the press and severely restricts its access to him.

Foskett presents an in-depth big picture, leaving the reader to connect the dots and draw causal inferences to understand Clarence Thomas the man and the judge. Apparently, Foskett intended to have a concluding chapter analyzing the “thick description,” but his publisher was [*344] opposed. Nonetheless, this book is a vital source for scholars of Justice Thomas’ jurisprudential development. It is also a fascinating narrative about his life and his path to the High Court from impoverished circumstances unlike most or all of his colleagues. Of course, any book that seems to be sympathetic to Thomas engenders criticism, and this book was hit fairly hard in the WASHINGTON POST and the NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW, although it was praised in the NEW REPUBLIC. Much of this antipathy reflects on the reviewers, not the book, which presents a balanced account and a minimalist appraisal of Thomas’ life, not his jurisprudence.

Upon graduation from Yale Law School, Thomas was initially rejected by every law firm to which he applied in Atlanta, though Foskett reports he eventually received an invitation to one firm, but after he rejected an offer from a black sole practitioner in Savannah, Georgia and after he accepted his first job in the spring of 1974. He began as Assistant Attorney General in Jefferson City, MO, in the office of state Attorney General, John Danforth, who later became a US Senator and was one of his most eloquent advocates in his Supreme Court confirmation. He worked for Monsanto Corporation from 1977-1979 in the pesticide and agriculture division. Subsequently, he was Legislative Assistant to Senator Danforth from 1979-1981, Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights in the US Dept. of Education (1981-82), and Chairman of the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (1982-1990). Much of Foskett’s original research concerns his time in the latter two federal posts, when Thomas was a political moderate, but came under the tutelage of Straussian intellectual mentors and other conservative activists.

The grandson of a sharecropper on the Thomas side and independent farmers on the Anderson side of his family Thomas was born on June 28, 1948, near Savannah, GA, the second child of M.C. Thomas and Leola Williams. He was raised, after his parents divorced, by his grandparents, who owned a 75 acre farm in Savannah. His grandfather, Myres Anderson, died in 1983, and Thomas keeps a bust of him in his office, in addition to portraits of Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass.

Thomas has said that he restricts his public speaking, because as a child he learned an English patois based on an African dialect. As a result, he has long emphasized listening more than speaking out in public. Foskett believes his silence in Court has been a mistake because the public assumes that he is not intelligent enough for the job. He was educated in Catholic schools in Savannah, graduating from St. John Vianney Minor Concepcion Seminary in 1968. He graduated ninth in his class at Holy Cross in 1971 and received a J.D. from Yale in 1974. At Yale he was a political activist with some leftwing views. When and how he became a conservative activist is not known in any detail, other than that his views emerged during his time as Chair of the EEOC.

A NASCAR fan, in 1999 he became the only Supreme Court justice to serve as Grand Marshal at the Daytona 500, and, a weight-lifter, he is perhaps the most athletic since Byron White and William O. Douglas. He attends daily mass at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church on days when [*345] he is in Washington. He urges others in speeches, such as at the 2003 University of Georgia Law School graduation, not to feel like “victims,” no matter how many trials and tribulations they might face: “Today as the fabric of society is saturated with complaint and protest, each of you has the opportunity to be a hero,” he said. “Do what you know must be done.”

In addition to recounting a biography of Justice Thomas, this book has three important sub-plots involving life in the segregated south, the influence of his grandfather, and finally, the Washington culture of public interest groups competing for influence. The latter’s “feeding frenzy” is perhaps most familiar to most readers, though the details of Thomas’s torment during his confirmation process, are generally not known and can be found in this book. The depictions of a segregated South will be familiar to many, but they contribute to a more complete understanding of our central figure’s view of the world today, which entails a sense of liberal outrage, not unlike what some neoconservatives claim they retain from their misbegotten periods of youthful idealism.

However, for readers of the LAW & POLITICS BOOK REVIEW, the big issues raised by the book are: a) Why Thomas became a radical, if inconsistent, conservative who has abandoned the federal role in regulation coming from the Interstate Commerce Clause; b) How Thomas can condemn affirmative action although he accepted the benefits of such a program earlier in his career; and c) Why he changed his views from radical left to radical right, while still retaining some sensitivities on race that a leftist might share. Foskett chose not to answer these questions directly because he felt that Thomas was still too young to reach conclusions. Instead, this reviewer has tried to connect the dots in the book. Even as I acknowledge that Thomas might indeed change, particularly in his jurisprudence, what seems clear from Foskett’s excellent biography is that Thomas’ temperament is prone to extremism. Even a book that chooses not to examine Thomas’ jurisprudence or to draw links to his basic philosophy has an implicit purpose which is well served: the thick description of an interesting, as well as a vastly important life.

Foskett does not try to psycho-analyze, but instead describes the direct influences on the young Thomas, growing up without a strong parental figure until he and his brother went to live with their grandfather. His ambitions and aspirations were also shared by his grandfather and the poor folks of Pin Point, Georgia. Chief among his formative experiences was the Jim Crow discrimination in Pin Point and the individual responsibility that his grandfather preached. How to cope with such adversity is not an issue for most highly educated Americans, who would find such a description in JUDGING THOMAS to be instructive, even if they have little empathy for Thomas today.

From a psychological perspective, the suppressed anger and occasional angry outbursts during his confirmation process might reflect rebellion against an absent mother who handed him over to his disciplinarian grandfather in his formative years. The book has prompted me to conclude that the contradictions and ambiguity of his thoughts led him to [*346] remain silent, but to act firmly when he feels most confident, reflecting the values of self-reliance, hard work, loyalty and family, tough love and no-excuses. He has the Catholic courage to persist in unpopular convictions at the cost of suffering Christ-like persecution. While he is in apparent denial (or is he?) that he has hypocritically benefited from affirmative action, he also did suffer intense discrimination that barred him from reading in the public library, from attending the better white public schools, even though the schools were not supposed to be segregated, from swimming at certain beaches as a child, that restricted his access to a government that only benefited whites, and blocked his competition for work in Atlanta law firms, among any number of other situations.

His Catholic faith has given him a distinct identity from most African-Americans. His grandfather, Myers Anderson, converted because of the religious influence of a friend, and both he and Thomas held deep resentment against mulatto elites, who considered their dark black complexion and accents as signs of inferiority. As Foskett reports, “despite his business success,” Anderson “was never part of Savannah’s elite class of black business men. . . Indeed, he suffered almost as many insults from elite blacks as from bigoted whites” (p.61). “Thomas deeply resented the condescension (pp.61-62). Yet, Thomas has rarely articulated his hurt feelings for the insults about his dialect and his poverty in Pin Point. This deep-seated resentment against intra-black prejudice, Foskett implies, partly explains why and how he can now distance himself from mainstream black opinion. While Anderson did not benefit from white customers and was a self-made man, albeit with his own entrepreneurial ancestors, Thomas has not see any problem using whatever advantages the white world had to offer him, even if he has remained suspicious of it—ever since members of his seminary in Kansas expressed little sympathy after the Martin Luther King, Jr. assassination. At the same time, Thomas believed that he must work harder and be smarter than anyone else, which he clearly thinks he has done and thus deserves all of his promotions.

Thomas was concerned in his youth with buchra (demon), which was part of the African animist looking for supra-natural solutions (such as being recruited to special parochial schools and colleges, as well as affirmative action promotions in his career?). Thomas admired the poetry of Paul Laurence Dunbar, which seems to justify dissembling as a coping response to the ambiguities and unfairnesses in life (again, such as for affirmative action?). Perhaps, Thomas has thought that he was being compensated for what was denied to his grandfather, who could not take classes at Savannah State College and could not have white customers in his businesses. Thus, Thomas, facing hostility and domination throughout his youth, learned that he should never lie but also never tell the complete truth. Foskett quotes friends who conclude that Thomas apparently does not even like his Supreme Court job. He may understand his ambivalence, but he would never admit it to himself, let alone the world. Yet, he also seems to feel like he has earned the position he has attained.

This reviewer believes that he met [*347] Clarence Thomas in the spring of 1974 in the Yale Law School Library. We spoke for at least a half an hour. What I recall is a young, loquacious individual in painter’s pants and combat boots, the fashion of that time during the US invasion of Cambodia. Thomas was clearly a known-entity to all in the room. He stressed to me, above all else, the “necessity of gaining power,” if you want to achieve something good for society.” Thomas appeared to me then as a leftist of sorts, or an iconoclast, with a disposition to shock, just as Foskett depicts. But he also wanted power and advised this stranger to find a way to attain it in order to make a positive difference in life. It does suggest that Thomas might have been more opportunistic than his jurisprudence would suggest. And, he still remains very committed to fighting civil rights.

Yet, Thomas is as generous with the needy as anyone. Fostkett describes how he helps young students and meets with school children weekly, apparently more often than any other justice. He gives speeches to conservative legal associations and to schools and universities, often those with whom he has a personal connection. Though quiet on the bench, he is loquacious and charismatic with friends and associates. He knows all the Supreme Court employees by name, as well as members of their families and where they attend school. He possibly gives more volunteer time than any Supreme Court justice, particularly with underprivileged black students.

Foskett, a white liberal committed to civil rights, is clearly impressed by Thomas’ virtues. Still, the book begs many questions. Some are factual: There is no discussion of the veracity of Anita Hill’s allegations or her motives. The sourcing of the book is light, which is typical of journalism but still discomfiting. Very few important quotes are cited, including those taken from Thomas’ public speeches. There would be no violation of journalistic ethics if an on-the record Thomas quote were identified in order to place it in proper context. Nor are many facts sourced, including those about any number of historical occurrences, such as stories about Thomas’ ancestors and different versions of contemporary events. The endnotes tend to be drawn from archives but give little indication when and why confidentiality was necessary.

Foskett’s reports of oral history must be accepted on faith, although his reputation for integrity and thoroughness as a reporter is very high indeed. He certainly is no Kitty Kelley or David Brock, but, given the need for more citations to his sources, one might wonder whether he more resembles Seymour Hersch who wrote about My Lai and Abu Grahib, or the discredited biography of JFK. For example, was Myres Anderson, the central figure of Thomas’ youth, really the father of Clarence Thomas’ cousin and aunt? It would have been useful to know whether a source was a member the circle of Thomas allies, including former Supreme Court clerks and former colleagues, or among his critics. One does get the sense, from the lack of any embarrassing information, that few critics were tapped as Foskett sources. Perhaps, that is the only way to obtain reliable information about Thomas, since his critics would infer the worst about him. For example, it would be useful to learn that his silence, while colleagues [*348] aggressively question lawyers during oral arguments, results in part from a stubborn intent not to follow the herd.

The answers to a few of these puzzles can be inferred. A reader can easily deduce that the hours of tedious and silent work for his grandfather in his delivery and farming businesses instilled and reinforced Thomas’ taciturn temperament. The confirmation hearings probably helped to radicalize his subsequent jurisprudence. He felt that his treatment before the Senate committee was unjust, and that the public consideration of the sexual harassment accusation was racially motivated. He rebelled later on in life, not only against racism but also against the repressive order of his domineering grandfather. Yet, while on the Court, Thomas has returned to his Catholicism. He seethes within, even though he can be the life of the party among friends and friendly rivals.

Yet, Thomas’ private persona is much different from the general impression conveyed by his behavior on the Court. In fact, the book shows that he is fiercely independent, which is connected to the upbringing by his grandfather, whose solution to racism was self-reliance. It is also presaged by a number of important incidents in his earlier life, as when his sole voice for a moderate course of action proved the Black Student Union at Holy Cross to be wrong. The radical group issued demands and called for an exodus of all the black students, but Thomas’ more conservative strategy in the end won the desired concessions from the Holy Cross administration. Personal independence and moderate action became the identity that he would project, even as he bristled at racial segregation. He remained a moderate as head of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a reputation he cultivated when considered for a Court of Appeals position and subsequently for the Supreme Court. Yet, it was also at this moment when he began studying great books and interpreting their hidden meanings under the tutelage of his Straussian mentors. Indeed, this seems to be the main puzzle in Thomas’ development not fully described by Foskett, despite his interviews with former teachers and the former law clerks most familiar with his intellectual approach.

Thomas seems to reflect an eclectic combination of influences, from Leo Strauss and conservative Catholicism, to his love-hate relationship with his grandfather. His intellectual mentors, Ken Masugi and John Marini, were both trained by Harry Jaffa, one of the most prominent Strauss students at the University of Chicago and a strong proponent of natural rights theory, which, Foskett tells us, appealed to Thomas’ sense of racial injustice. (A relatively rare error in the book misidentifies his institution, which is the Claremont Graduate Institute). In addition, the book wonderfully describes the many contradictory influences of his family, which might help explain the contradictions in his jurisprudence. One can surmise that Thomas’ intellectual mentors helped him to work through these inconsistencies, by using Socratic reasoning to understand what constitutes wisdom.

The major task of JUDGING THOMAS is, therefore, left to the reader. Although he has issued few statements from the bench, except for that occasional [*349] outburst over racial symbols, which he does not regard as protected speech, Thomas has made his mark on judicial history. This book helps us understand why he sees no inconsistency in his views on natural rights, strict constructionism, textualism, originalism and judicial restraint, in light of his participation in judicially active decisions of the Rehnquist Court, demonstrating that such activism can originate from the right, as well as from the left.

REFERENCES:

For a sympathetic biography:

Thomas, Andrew Peyton. 2001. CLARENCE THOMAS: A BIOGRAPHY. San Francisco,
CA: Encounter Books.

For a very critical appraisal of the originalism of Justices Thomas and Scalia:

Smith, Christopher E., and Joyce A. Baugh. 2000. THE REAL CLARENCE THOMAS: CONFIRMATION VERACITY MEETS PERFORMANCE REALITY. New York: Peter Lang.

For a moderately critical appraisal:

Marcosson, Samuel A. 2002. ORIGINAL SIN: CLARENCE THOMAS AND THE FAILURE OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONSERVATIVES. New York: New York University Press.

For a sympathetic appraisal:

Gerber, Scott D. 2002. FIRST PRINCIPLES: THE JURISPRUDENCE OF CLARENCE THOMAS. New York: New York University Press.

Transcript of “A Conversation on the Relevance of Foreign Law for American Constitutional Adjudication with U.S. Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia & Stephen Breyer,” (January 13, 2005), http://www.wcl.american.edu/secle/founders/2005/050113.cfm . An audio version may still be available at:

rtsp://video.c-span.org/archive/sc/sc011305_scalia.rm?mode=compact

CASE REFERENCES:

DESERT PALACE v. COSTA, 539 US 90 (2003).

GOOD NEWS BIBLE CLUB v. MILFORD, 533 US 98 (2001).

GRUTTER v. BOLLINGER, 539 U.S. 982 (2003).

LAWRENCE v. TEXAS, 539 U.S. 558 (2003).

PGA TOUR v. MARTIN, 532 US 661 (2001).

ROE v. WADE, 410 US 113 (1973).

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