Sally Steenland: The Religious Right wasn’t created to battle abortion

  The Supreme Court is hearing two cases on marriage equality this week, 40 years after it granted women access to legal and safe abortions in the landmark case Roe v. Wade. The timing of these cases—and the fact that both issues have spurred fierce and decisive culture wars—has prompted some legal experts and pundits to worry that a Court decision to legalize marriage for same-sex couples will trigger a public backlash for decades to come.

  This is supposedly what happened with abortion following Roe. According to the pundits and experts, the 1973 decision to legalize abortion outraged millions of Americans and mobilized them into a powerful movement to defend the rights of the unborn. They created the Moral Majority, the Christian Coalition, Focus on the Family, and Concerned Women for America. The Court’s decision in Roe triggered the birth of the religious right—or so the argument goes.