"Recall that the court, speaking through Justice Blackmun, said that there were two novel claims of right presented for decision. Both claims arose under the Due Process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. They were “novel” in the sense that, again as Justice Blackmun saw it, neither had yet been recognized by the Supreme Court. These were, of course, the claim that unborn children-the “fetus”, per the Court-were “persons” with a right to “life” guaranteed by the Due Process Clause, and the female plaintiff’s claim that the “liberty” protected by that clause included a liberty to abort. The court recognized that both claims mattered much to those making them. But one had priority; the court said that if the unborn’s claim prevailed, the plaintiff’s case dissolved."