Senator Josh Hawley had two reasons to celebrate Dobbs v Jackson: the first is that as an ardent opponent of abortion, the Supreme Court decision overturned Roe v Wade. The second reason is that his wife worked on the Supreme Court decision.
Mr Hawley spoke to reporters on a press call after the Supreme Court decision and spoke about how his wife Erin Morrow Hawley had worked on the Dobbs v Jackson case.
“She litigated this case, wrote the brief of this case along with the solicitor general of Mississippi and so she has litigated this with Mississippi since the court granted cert on it, a year ago now,” he told reporters.
Mr Hawley met his future wife when they clerked for Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts. Like the Senator and former attorney general of Missouri, she is also a graduate of Yale Law School. Ms Hawley works as the senior legal counsel at the Alliance Defending Freedom, a socially conservative organisation.
As the St Louis Dispatch reported, she spoke about her work on the Dobbs v Jackson case last year at a Lincoln Day Dinner in St Charles, Missouri. Mississippi’s law would restrict abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
“This past year I have been blessed to have a front-row seat on this case”, she said. “As a conservative mother, I can tell you it has been the project of a lifetime.”
Ms Hawley said that she often traveled with her youngest child, who was six months old at the time, which she said made her case feel more “tangible.”
The senator took time at the beginning of his call to praise his wife, with whom he also has two other children.
“This is obviously a very, very big victory for her personally and I'm just immensely, immensley proud of her”, Mr Hawley told reporters, saying the move was a victory for the anti-abortion movement.
“This rights a grave injustice the court visited on the nation. I’m ecstatic to see this wrong righted”, he said. “My guess this will be hugely energising to Republican and conservative voters.”
