Abortion foes focus on potential nominee

“That’s her Achilles’ heel,’’ said Curt Levey, executive director of the Committee for Justice, which opposes Wood’s rulings on abortion. “It tells you that she’s probably not going to be selected, because Obama doesn’t have the stomach for this to be about an abortion debate.’’

Obama’s intentions remain unclear, but Levey’s comments encapsulate a message that Wood’s foes are sending as the White House ponders a list of possible candidates. For Wood, who turns 60 in July, this vacancy could be her last shot at the court.

Widely seen as studious and disciplined, she serves on the closely watched US Circuit Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and teaches at the University of Chicago, where Obama was a law professor.

Wood is an antitrust expert with an interest in international law and a history of opinions supporting court access for people alleging discrimination or challenging government rules. She has spoken against a “narrow, literal’’ reading of the Constitution, suggesting that jurisprudence best evolves through “an interactive process’’ that involves society, scholars, and the courts.

Liberal supporters praise Wood for her willingness to challenge Seventh Circuit Judges Frank H. Easterbrook and Richard A. Posner, formidable thinkers admired by conservatives. Despite their ideological differences, the three are friends who often eat lunch together.

Critics “are misconstruing some carefully reasoned opinions for their own political ends,’’ said Nan Aron, head of the liberal Alliance for Justice, who noted that Wood’s support for abortion rights is not unusual.

Social conservatives criticize Wood for drafting opinions opposing a ban on late-term abortion and an Indiana law that required a waiting period for women seeking abortions.

In her 2002 Indiana dissent, she said the majority, led by Easterbrook, misapplied Supreme Court precedent, “substituted its own factual assumptions for evidence,’’ and “failed to focus on the women for whom the statute will create problems.’’

Last year, an Internet advertisement sponsored by a group then known as the Judicial Confirmation Network focused on Wood’s rulings in a complex lawsuit designed to halt violence at abortion clinics. The case went to the Supreme Court three times and took nearly 20 years to resolve. The high court overturned two of Wood’s decisions, by votes of 8 to 1 and 8 to 0.

The case, known as NOW v. Scheidler, pitted lawyers for the National Organization for Women against the Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League. Filed in 1986, the lawsuit sought an injunction to prevent violence at abortion clinics.

When Wood joined the Seventh Circuit in 1996, the case had already gone to the Supreme Court, which gave the green light to NOW’s attempt to invoke the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act against the protesters.

In a subsequent seven-week trial, a federal jury concluded that the protesters had repeatedly broken the law.

Jurors awarded damages to two clinics, and the trial judge imposed a nationwide injunction on Joseph M. Scheidler, the head of the Pro-Life Action League, and his organization. When Scheidler appealed, a panel that included Wood affirmed the verdict, 3 to 0.

When the case went to the Supreme Court a second time, the justices agreed that the protesters had broken the law. But they found that the 117 violations did not amount to extortion, an essential component of the RICO Act.