Roe lawyer Sarah Weddington helped redefine abortion rights
ABC News
Sarah Weddington is being remembered this week as a champion of feminism whose work impacted the nation’s politics as views shifted on abortion
AUSTIN, Texas -- Sarah Weddington, who as a young lawyer from Texas won the Roe v. Wade case at the U.S. Supreme Court, is being remembered this week as a champion of feminism whose work impacted the nation's politics as views shifted on abortion. She died Sunday at age 76.
Weddington was 26 when she successfully argued the case that legalized the right to abortion throughout the United States. The Supreme Court's ruling in 1973 cemented her place in history.
“I just see her role at that time as being so courageous,” said Sarah Wheat, a spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas. “For all of us who work in what is, you know — it can be a very challenging field — I feel like that’s a lesson she has shared with me and so many others.”
Roe v. Wade changed the alignment of the major political parties and helped define the playbook U.S. presidents would have to follow to confirm their Supreme Court nominees, said Florida State University law professor Mary Ziegler, who specializes in the legal history of reproduction.
