As always, you can find the Dobbs v. Jackson decision here.

Paragraph 5 of 11

Sentence 1 of 4

The next paragraph opens with two claims:

“Instead of following these authorities, Roe relied largely on two articles by a pro-abortion advocate who claimed that Coke had intentionally misstated the common law because of his strong anti-abortion views.37”

And here are the two claims:

• Roe did not heed “these authorities.”
• “Roe relied largely on two articles by a pro-abortion advocate who claimed that Coke had intentionally misstated the common law because of his strong anti-abortion views.”

I’m not even sure what to make of the first claim above. If the “authorities” have made assertions rather than arguments, then there’s no reason to accept what they’ve written except their authority itself. That’s almost the textbook definition of the appeal to unqualified authority fallacy.

As for the second: I’ll need to do some actual digging to determine to what extent Roe relied on the two articles mentioned.

And here is the text of end note 37:

“See 410 U.S., at 136, n. 26 (citing Means II); 410 U.S., at 132–133, n. 21 (citing Means I).”

This is a weird sentence, and both claims are undetermined:

• Roe did not heed “these authorities.”
• “Roe relied largely on two articles by a pro-abortion advocate who claimed that Coke had intentionally misstated the common law because of his strong anti-abortion views.”