The Supreme Court’s 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade legalized abortion–but the debate was far from over, continuing to be a political battleground to this day. Bringing to light key voices that illuminate the case and its historical context, Before Roe v. Wade looks back and recaptures how the arguments for and against abortion took shape as claims about the meaning of the Constitution—and about how the nation could best honor its commitment to dignity, liberty, equality, and life.
In this ground-breaking book, Linda Greenhouse, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who covered the Supreme Court for 30 years for The New York Times, and Reva Siegel, a renowned professor at Yale Law School, collect documents illustrating cultural, political, and legal forces that helped shape the Supreme Court’s decision and the meanings it would come to have over time. A new afterword to the book explores what the history of conflict over abortion in the decade before Roe might reveal about the logic of conflict in the ensuing decades. The entanglement of the political parties in the abortion debate in the period before the Court ruled raises the possibility that Roe itself may not have engendered political polarization around abortion as is commonly supposed, but instead may have been engulfed by it.
Alzheimer’s – (Canada – Alzheimer Society)Celebration of Life MonthCo-dependency – (U.S.)Constipation – (U.S.)Glaucoma– (U.S.)National Mentoring Month – (U.S.)Ontario March of Dimes Month – (Canada)Poverty in America – (U.S.)Radon Action MonthSelf-Help GroupStalking – (U.S.)Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month – (U.S.)Volunteer Blood Donor Month – (U.S.)Weight Loss
Awareness Days in January:
January 1 – Global Family Day – formerly One Day of Peace and Sharing – (UN) January 2 – Personal Trainer January 1 – World Day of Peace January 4 – World Braille Day – International January 15 – Intestinal Malrotation and Volvulus January 24 – Moebius Syndrome January 27 – Family Literacy Day – ABC Life Literacy Canada January 27 – Holocaust Remembrance Day – (UN) – (International) January 28 – Young Carers (U.K.) January 30 – CTE (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy) January 31 – World Leprosy Day – (International) January 31 – Street Children’s Day
Awareness Weeks in January:
5th-11th January – Lichen Sclerosus Awareness week (UK)3rd Wk – National Non-Smoking Week – Canada – Canadian Council on Smoking and Health3rd Wed – Weedless Wednesday – Canada – Canadian Council on Smoking and Health
Kamala Harris made history when she was sworn in as the 49th U.S. vice president on January 20, 2021, becoming the first woman, the first Black American, and the first Asian American to occupy the office.
When Harris was chosen as Joe Biden’s running mate in August 2020, the former California senator and attorney general, the daughter of Jamaican and Indian immigrants, became the third woman to be named on a major political party’s ticket, following Geraldine Ferraro (chosen by Walter Mondale) in 1984 and Sarah Palin (chosen by John McCain) in 2008. Harris made her own presidential bid in the 2020 Democratic Party’s primary before suspending her campaign and endorsing Biden. Together, they defeated incumbents Donald Trump and Mike Pence.
“In many ways, this moment embodies our character as a nation,” Harris said on the evening of her inauguration. “It demonstrates who we are. Even in dark times—we not only dream. We do. We not only see what has been, we see what can be.”
As second in line for the U.S. presidency, Harris has come closer than any woman before her to breaking what Hillary Clinton famously called “the highest, hardest glass ceiling.”
On January 20, 1961, on the newly renovated east front of the United States Capitol, John Fitzgerald Kennedy is inaugurated as the 35th president of the United States.
It was a cold and clear day, and the nation’s capital was covered with a snowfall from the previous night. The ceremony began with a religious invocation and prayers, and then African American opera singer Marian Anderson sang “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and Robert Frost recited his poem “The Gift Outright.” Kennedy was administered the oath of office by Chief Justice Earl Warren.
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