After lending her name to the landmark Supreme Court case that legalized abortion, Norma McCorvey, better known as Jane Roe, became a pro-life ally, appearing at marches, rallies, and outside of abortion facilities to tell her story and defend life. Then yesterday headlines crowing that “Woman behind U.S. abortion ruling was paid to recant” and “The woman Behind Roe v. Wade didn’t change her mind. She was paid” began sweeping across the internet. According to a documentary set to air on Hulu this Friday, McCorvey either recanted her pro-life stance near the end of her life, or perhaps was never pro-life at all.
The documentary called “AKA, Jane Roe,” tells the story of Roe v. Wade from the viewpoint of an aging Norma McCorvey, using footage from shortly before her death. In the film, she refers to her statements as her “deathbed confession.” McCorvey says, “If a young woman wants to have an abortion—fine… You know, that’s why they call it ‘choice.’ It’s your choice,” and suggests that her public pro-life stance was financially motivated, although it is worth noting that, contrary to the headlines, there is no evidence that she was actually paid to become pro-life.
Several people who knew McCorvey personally have come forward and said that the Norma McCorvey featured in “AKA Jane Roe” does not sound like the McCorvey they knew. Operation Rescue has responded to the film saying that,
The makers of ‘AKA Jane Roe’ should be ashamed that they took advantage of Norma in the vulnerable last days of her life, then released their spurious movie after she passed away when she could not defend herself.
Even The Daily Beast pointed out that, if everything about McCorvey’s conversion was a ruse, several of her life choices do not make sense.
McCorvey has long been an enigmatic figure. The plaintiff in the case that legalized abortion, she never had an abortion herself and later admitted that she had lied about being raped. She joined the pro-life movement but gained a reputation for demanding enormous sums of money in exchange for interviews and appearances. It may be true that she was not convinced of the pro-life position or that she recanted it at the end of her life, or it may simply be that she was a complicated person and that the makers of “AKA Jane Roe” leveraged her complex past to misconstrue reality. As Operation Rescue pointed out, releasing this movie after her death means that she cannot tell us whether or not she has been misrepresented.
Even if she was insincere in her pro-life advocacy, and even if she was pro-abortion at the end of her life and her comments in “AKA Jane Roe” are not in any way a misrepresentation, the fact remains that abortion is evil.
The truth of the pro-life position does not depend on the veracity of its proponents and cannot be dismantled by a documentary revealing Jane Roe’s “deathbed confession.” We are not pro-life because of any pro-life advocate, and the personhood of preborn babies does not depend on whether Jane Roe became pro-life. If Norma McCorvey had never aligned herself with the pro-life movement, Roe v. Wade would still be a misruling that should be overturned. It is disappointing to learn that Norma McCorvey appears to have recanted her pro-life stance at the end of her life and that she may have been lying when she was a pro-life advocate, but an insincere messenger does not change the fact that abortion destroys the life of a precious child created in the image of God.
That’s why we’ll never stop fighting for the rights of children to live, and the rights of women to receive the care and support they need as they bring children into the world. That’s what Minnesota Family Council is dedicated to doing. You can support our work today by clicking here.
