Chief Justice John Roberts walks to the Senate chamber of the Capitol building, Jan. 16, 2020.
Photo:
Matt Rourke/Associated Press
Joan Biskupic
writing for CNN.com, July 26:
Chief Justice
John Roberts
privately lobbied fellow conservatives to save the constitutional right to abortion down to the bitter end, but May’s unprecedented leak of a draft opinion reversing Roe v. Wade made the effort all but impossible, multiple sources familiar with negotiations told CNN.
It appears unlikely that Roberts’ best prospect—Justice
Brett Kavanaugh
—was ever close to switching his earlier vote, despite Roberts’ attempts that continued through the final weeks of the session. . . . Roberts’ persuasive efforts, difficult even from the start, were thwarted by the sudden public nature of the state of play. . . .
The two men have known each other since the early 1990s when they both worked in the
George H.W. Bush
administration. . . . They share similar Roman Catholic roots, prep school backgrounds and Ivy League educations (Roberts, Harvard; Kavanaugh, Yale). They now live so close to each other in Maryland that abortion rights protesters sometimes go to both homes on the same evening.
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Appeared in the July 27, 2022, print edition as ‘Notable & Quotable: Roberts.’
