Politics & Power Quote by Robert Casey

Casey’s line is engineered to do two things at once: describe a legal landscape as if it were a moral emergency, and make that emergency feel uniquely American. “Abortion on demand” is the tell. It’s a political term of art, not a clinical one, designed to conjure consumer whim and moral casualness. Pairing it with “throughout the full nine months” pushes the audience toward an image of elective late-term abortions as standard practice, even though later procedures are comparatively rare and typically shaped by medical catastrophe, fetal anomaly, or barriers that delay care. The phrase “for virtually any reason” completes the frame: permissiveness isn’t just policy, it’s decadence.

Context matters. Casey, a Democrat with a strong anti-abortion identity (and father of Bob Casey Jr.), was an emblem of a fading intraparty coalition after Roe v. Wade. In the 1990s, especially after Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), abortion politics shifted from the existential question of legality to the tactical fight over limits, exceptions, and cultural legitimacy. His language tracks that pivot: it’s less about constitutional doctrine than about setting the Overton window for restrictions by painting the status quo as extreme.

The comparative move - “No other developed democracy” - is rhetorical leverage. It borrows the authority of Europe-as-moderation to shame American jurisprudence as out of step with peers, implying that “reasonable” nations restrict more, so the U.S. must have drifted into radicalism. Subtext: if you oppose bans, you’re defending something no civilized country would tolerate. It’s a neatly packaged argument aimed at persuadable centrists, with outrage built in and nuance priced out.