There’s a straight line from US racial segregation to the anti-abortion movement | Randall Balmer

Leaders of the religious right would have us believe that Roe v Wade mobilized apolitical Christians. The real story is very different

The supreme court's refusal to block Texas's restrictive new abortion law suggests that the end to country-wide legal abortion might be at hand. For white evangelicals, the rank and file of the anti-abortion movement who have worked tirelessly to overturn the 1973 Roe v Wade decision, this represents the culmination of efforts that date back to - well, about 1980.

Although leaders of the religious right would have us believe that the Roe decision was the catalyst for their political mobilization in the 1970s, that claim does not withstand historical scrutiny. What prompted evangelical interest in politics, in fact, was a defense of racial segregation.