Sekulow says that with the replacement of Sandra Day O'Connor with Samuel Alito, he is "optimistic" that anti-abortion forces will carry the day, adding to the chorus of voices on the Christian right who believe the end of legal abortion will soon be at hand. He is seeking to add 200,000 names to the amicus brief that will be filed by his legal center on behalf of several members of Congress, promising that this Supreme Court decision "could finally end the practice known as partial birth abortion."

Go here for a recent Sekulow analysis of the odds of a pro-life victory. Some of his quotes from the dissenters in the 2000 Stenberg v. Carhart decision, which shot down a similar ban in Nevada, are chilling. Justice Clarence Thomas, for instance, compared abortion to "infanticide" and parroted the gory tactics of pro-lifers in describing late-term abortions thusly: "The physician literally sucks the fetus' brain from the skull."

This will be a telling test of how deeply John Roberts and Samuel Alito are committed to the demise of Roe.