1 Year Since Supreme Court Decision To Overturn Roe V. Wade

Saturday will mark one year since the United States Supreme Court’s landmark decision overturning 1973's Roe v. Wade opinion and ending 50 years of constitutionally protected access to abortion in all 50 states. For some, it will be a joyful occasion.

The 6-3 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health last June 24, because of the leaked draft opinion several months earlier, was widely anticipated, but it still sent a shockwave across the nation and a year later Americans are still coming to grips with its impact.

"For us, we’re celebrating the Dobbs decision," said Oklahoma Senator James Lankford at a Stand for Life rally he hosted at the Capitol Tuesday evening.

Sen. Lankford (R-OK) said, it's impossible to know with precision but, thanks to Dobbs, it’s estimated about 200,000 babies were born in the past year that wouldn’t have been born if Roe were still intact.

"That's 200,000 smiling faces on playgrounds, that's 200,000 silly songs starting in kindergarten," smiled Lankford. "That's 200,000 families that’ll be blessed with looking in the eyes of a child."

It’s also an unquantified number of families that have suffered in the past year because getting reproductive health care has become much more complicated, especially in the 14 states, Oklahoma among them, that in the wake of Dobbs imposed near total bans on abortion.

Other states, meanwhile, expanded access to abortion, or even codified it in their state constitutions. Democrats in Washington are trying to do the same thing at the federal level, to nullify a decision they believe belongs in the Court’s hall of shame.

"Because unlike other enlightened decisions that the Supreme Court has reached throughout the years which enhance freedom," said House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) Friday, "the Dobbs decision restricted and limited and undermine freedom for women all across America."

Oklahoma’s all-Republican delegation is, of course, 100 percent pro-life. Congresswoman Stephanie Bice (R-OK5) said the majority of justices rightly recognized that access to abortion is not something for courts to determine.

"In Oklahoma, there was a big push for this to be put in the hands of the electorate," Rep. Bice said in an interview Friday, "and that’s exactly what happened with the Dobbs decision."

And, importantly, Lankford said, the decision has prompted renewed discussion of what he sees as the key question in the abortion debate: when does life become life?

"We have not as a nation had to have the conversation among individuals, when is a life a life," said Lankford in an interview Wednesday, "that’s just not been in our national dialogue because Roe v. Wade took away that dialogue from the country. Now it’s back...we should have that dialogue."

"Americans don’t all agree on the issue of children and abortion, we just don’t," he continued. "So, there’s going to be this national conversation that’s going to continue for a very long time."

And fitting with the long tradition associated with this issue, there will be rallies Saturday. Abortion rights advocates will be at the Supreme Court, while pro-life groups will be at the Lincoln Memorial.