Origin story of the Texas law that could upend Roe v. Wade

The road to a Texas law that bans most abortions in the state began in a town called Waskom, population 1,600.

This past week, the Supreme Court decided not to interfere with the state’s strict abortion law, which sidesteps the high court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.

It astonished many that Texas could essentially outmaneuver one of the Supreme Court’s most contentious decisions.

The law does so by following a novel legal approach that Waskom used in its ordinance.

The Waskom ordinance prohibits city officials from enforcing the abortion ban. Instead, private citizens can sue anyone who performs an abortion in the city or assists someone in obtaining one.