"Even though it was not actively enforcing the Texas abortion law, the D.A.’s office could not be described as receptive to a challenge to it. In the 1960s most states’ law enforcement agencies, including the Dallas District Attorney’s office, looked upon the numerous civil rights challenges that began coming their way as frivolous. They resented the time they took up. Nonetheless, given the times, Wade’s office had been expecting some kind of attack on the laws that discriminated against women. They thought perhaps women would strike out against protectionist labor laws. No one thought the abortion law would be challenged, and it came as a shock when it was. There had been no sense among the conservative, mostly male lawyers in the D.A.’s office that any major discontent had been building among women regarding abortion. Besides, they tended to view the state’s abortion law not as discriminatory against women so much as a statement about the moral standards society wanted to uphold. As a result, just as Weddington and Coffee had hoped, Wade’s office was totally unprepared for their attack on the state’s abortion laws. And from the minute Roe v. Wade and Does v. Wade were filed, Wade and his staff recognized that these were serious challenged and, therefore, potentially significant cases."