Merrick Garland in Mother Jones magazine

On Abortion: Record on abortion rights entirely blank

That's because the DC Circuit, where Garland has served for the past 19 years, almost never ends up on the frontlines of the culture wars; cases involving abortion or gay marriage rarely appear on its docket, which is heavily weighted with regulatory issues. And as someone who spent most of his pre-judicial career as a federal prosecutor, Garland hasn't had many opportunities to weigh in on Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion. Despite having gone through the judicial confirmation process once before, his record on the subject appears to be almost entirely blank.