Roe v. Wade

Glossary

• abortion voluntary termination of a pregnancy
• contraception deliberate prevention of pregnancy by drugs, techniques, or devices; also known as birth control
• eschews avoids, rejects
• embryo the fertilized egg as implanted in the womb through the first two months of development
• fetus the developing human after the second month of gestation
• “formulate a rule of constitutional law …” quotation from Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes in Chastleton Corporation et al. v. Sinclair et al. (1924)
• gestation pregnancy
• Hippocratic Oath an oath embodying the duties and obligations of physicians
• In toto entirely, in total
• Mr. Justice Holmes Oliver Wendell Holmes, associate justice of the Supreme Court
• Mr. Justice Peckham Rufus Wheeler Peckham, associate justice of the Supreme Court
• pendency the state of being pending or in process
• precedents legal decisions that serve as rules or patterns for future similar cases
• predicate precondition, requirement
• quickening stage of pregnancy at which fetal movement first occurs
• “so rooted in the traditions” quotation from Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Cardoza in Snyder v. Massachusetts (1934)
• trimester a period of three months
• viable capable of living outside a uterus