Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist passed away on Saturday evening.

Rehnquist had been battling with cancer for a while so the news isn’t entirely a shock. His death is a tragedy on a personal level — what death isn’t — but it opens up a major political question: what will be the makeup of the Supreme Court in the coming years?

Rehnquist’s loss coupled with Justice O’Connor’s resignation earlier this year has given President Bush the unique opportunity of nominating two justices to the Supreme Court in one year.

How will Roe v Wade fare with two new Bush-nominated justices? Will the Supreme Court shift rightwards on Roe and other social issues? Only time will tell. I can only hope that the idea of abortion rights is too deeply embedded in the social psyche for a major rollback to be possible. Once the genie is out of the bottle, there’s no putting it back. The time of coat hangars and backroom butchers is (thankfully) long gone.