Giving Compass' Take:

• The Supreme Court's Chief Justice, John G. Roberts, Jr. recently joined liberal justices and voted to stay a Louisiana admitting privileges law. The vote saved the state's abortion clinics for now.

• What role do donors play in reproductive justice?

• Learn about growing disparities in reproductive health and rights between states. 

The Supreme Court's chief justice is no advocate for abortion rights. While serving as George W. Bush's deputy solicitor general in the 1990s, John G. Roberts, Jr. co-authored a brief stating that Roe v. Wade, the original ruling that established abortion as a constitutional right, was wrongly decided. A conservative appointed to the Supreme Court by Bush in 2005, Roberts voted to uphold Congress' partial birth abortion ban in the 2007 case Gonzales v. Carhart, and dissented in the pivotal 2016 Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt decision, which struck down a series of Texas laws targeting abortion providers for creating an undue burden on women's choice.

But on February 7th, Roberts joined the court's liberal justices to stay a Louisiana admitting privileges law that would have likely left the state with a single practicing abortion doctor, and the court is now deciding whether to hear the case, June Medical Services v. Gee. His vote shocked many, as did his vote late last year not to hear two cases that might have stripped Planned Parenthood of Medicaid funding in some states.

Read the full article on the future of abortion in America by Rosemary Westwood at Pacific Standard