Henry Wade

Henry Menasco Wade (November 11, 1914—March 1, 2001), was a Texas lawyer who participated in two of the most notable US court cases of the 20th century, the prosecution of Jack Ruby for killing Lee Harvey Oswald and the US Supreme Court's decision legalizing abortion, Roe v. Wade.

Roe v. Wade

Wade represented the State of Texas at the 1970 trial of Norma McCorvey, an indigent pregnant woman, charged with procuring an abortion, a criminal offense at the time. McCorvey, and her inexperienced attorney, feminist activist Sarah Weddington, were intent upon mounting a constitutional challenge to the Texas statute prohibiting abortion. Consequently, Wade was also the respondent as the case worked its way through the appellate process, culminating in the Supreme Court's landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision which made abortion legal in the United States. Until that decision, Wade had never lost a case. Despite this reversal--and the unpopularity of the results with many conservative Texas voters--Wade himself was not blamed, and his political career did not suffer. He continued to serve in office for an additional fourteen years, and afterwards remained a fixture around the new Crowley Courts Building, where members of the Dallas Bar called him "the Chief". In 1995, the Henry Wade Juvenile Center was named in his honor, and in 2000, shortly before his death from Parkinson's disease, Texas Lawyer magazine named him as one of the 102 most influential lawyers of the 20th century.

Related Topics:
Norma McCorvey - Sarah Weddington - 1973 - Roe v. Wade - Abortion - United States - Crowley Courts Building - Parkinson's disease - Texas Lawyer

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