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In June 1969, 21-year-old Norma McCorvey discovered she was pregnant with her third child. She returned to Dallas, where friends advised her to falsely claim that she had been raped, incorrectly believing that Texas law allowed abortion in cases of rape and incest when it actually allowed abortion only "for the purpose of saving the life of the mother".

She attempted to obtain an illegal abortion, but found that the unauthorized facility had been closed down by the police. Eventually, she was referred to attorneys Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington. McCorvey would end up giving birth before the case was decided, and the child was put up for adoption.

In 1970, Coffee and Weddington filed suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas on behalf of McCorvey (under the alias Jane Roe). The defendant in the case was Dallas County District Attorney Henry Wade, who represented the State of Texas. McCorvey was no longer claiming her pregnancy was a result of rape, and later acknowledged that she had lied about having been raped, in hope to circumvent a Texas law that banned abortions except when the woman's life is in danger. "Rape" is not mentioned in the judicial opinions in the case.

On June 17, 1970, a three-judge panel of the District Court, consisting of judges Sarah T. Hughes, William McLaughlin Taylor Jr. and Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge (((Irving Loeb Goldberg))), unanimously declared the Texas law unconstitutional, finding that it violated the right to privacy found in the Ninth Amendment. In addition, the court relied on Justice (((Arthur Goldberg's))) 1965 concurrence in Griswold v. Connecticut. The court, however, declined to grant an injunction against enforcement of the law.

https://archive.is/5nZe5#selection-1399.0-1529.4