Norma McCorvey didn't want to become a poster child for abortion rights. The Texan

waitress, 22 and unintentionally pregnant for the third time, was just looking for a way

to end her pregnancy. It was the pair of feminist lawyers Sarah Weddington and Linda Coffey,

who she met with in a Dallas-Pizza joint in early 1970, who realized that she might be

their holy grail, the case they could use to overthrow bands on abortion across the

US. Norma McCorvey is better known as Jane

Row, the plaintiff in one of the most famous Supreme Court judgments of all, Roe v Wade. The

great irony is that McCorvey never actually had an abortion. She had given birth to the

so-called Row Baby in June 1970 and swiftly put it up for adoption. In her diary for 1973,

she didn't even mention the case that secured her place in history and still marks the

battle line between pro-choice and pro-life. Now, nearly 50 years later, Will Row v Wade soon

be overturned? This is Chex and Balance.

I'm John Frodo, the economist's US editor, and each week we take one big theme shaping American

politics and explore it in depth. Today, why does abortion divide America?

When the Supreme Court declined to block SB 8, a Texan law which prohibits most abortions

after just six weeks, it gave the strongest signal yet that the conservative majority

might be preparing to deny women the right to an abortion. The real test will come in a case

on their docket from Mississippi scheduled to be heard this fall, and direct challenge to Row

and the 1992 planned parenthood v Casey ruling which upheld it, the state wants to ban abortions

after 15 weeks. Will Row go? And what are the political implications of this fierce battle

over abortion rights?

With me to discuss all of this are John Fasman, the US digital editor, and me and rich,

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