THE MORAL TURN

The prospect of Donald Trump appointing a second or even a third nominee to the Court has buoyed up the pro-life movement and stirred hopes, long nursed, that the overruling of Roe v. Wade is now in reach. And yet the sovereign importance of overruling Roe is part of the distortion of our law and politics that Roe itself has fostered-and conservative jurisprudence has only deepened. For the conventional account, preserved among conservatives, is that Roe v. Wade merely needs to be overturned and then the question of abortion will be returned to the states, to the voters and their elected representatives, to decide.