On this date in 1973, the Supreme Court voted seven to two to legalize abortion in the United States. Polls indicate that in the 25 years since then, public attitudes toward abortion have not changed very much. Roughly 60 percent of Americans favor the provisions of Roe versus Wade. In the remaining 40 percent are people who want abortion to be legal, with more restriction, and those who believe abortion should not be available under any circumstances. But there have been subtle changes in how Americans feel about abortion in the last quarter century, since a new generation of young men and women, born since the Roe decision, are themselves having children. NPR's Dean Olsher reports.

DEAN OLSHER, NPR REPORTER: People under 25 would probably not be able to relate to the experience of Sharon McGee (ph). McGee grew up in an industrial part of Philadelphia known as Fishtown. There are still trolley tracks on the street in front of where her house used to stand. In 1960, McGee was four years old. She lived here with her mother and grandparents. Her father had left the family a couple of years before. Sharon McGee's mother was dating a man when she became pregnant again. She didn't tell the family that she was pregnant or that she was receiving injections of Lysol from a local woman in an attempt to abort the fetus. On the night of January 7, she became very sick.

SHARON MCGEE, MOTHER DIED IN ILLEGAL ABORTION: She called the guy who was paying for the abortion who was the father and said: "come get me." And he was maybe a mile away. And he came and got her, and as he was pulling up, she fell on the ground and collapsed. And he put her in the back seat of his car and drove her to the neighborhood hospital and delivered her in the emergency room, and drove away. And then, you know, my grandparents read it in the morning paper that a woman fitting my mother's description was at this hospital, which was not too far away. She basically died around the corner from my house. And my grandfather and grandmother went to the hospital and identified her.

OLSHER: Today, Sharon McGee is married and has two sons. She teaches in a Catholic school and deals regularly with younger women facing unwanted pregnancies.

MCGEE: I guess the thing I'm most struck by - by young women today is that they don't really know the struggle, and they take for granted that this is - you know, this is like a, you know, this is what you do, you know, if you need to do that. That's sort of a -- it feels like in my heart, you know, sort of a cheap way of looking at things. I don't ever say to them: "do you know?" -- you know, historically. But you know, I think that that's something that they are unaware of.

OLSHER: Perhaps younger women are unaware of everything that led to the legalization of abortion. They have grown up knowing that if they get pregnant, they have options. It's a completely different world from the one their mothers grew up in, legally and morally.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN, ABORTION RIGHTS ADVOCATE: People make mistakes. Sometimes people don't use condoms. Sometimes people forget to put their diaphragm in. This is why we have abortion.

OLSHER: This 26-year-old woman works at a reproductive rights foundation in Philadelphia. She asked that her name not be used because she doesn't want members of her family to know about the medical abortion she went through last month, along with her boyfriend.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN, A.R.A.: He was there with me the day I had the shot. And he was there with me when I expelled the fetus.

OLSHER: Is he a serious relationship for you?

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN, A.R.A.: Umm. Not right now, no. And that's part of the reason why - one of the reasons why I had an abortion is because it was not a serious relationship. He does not want children. I don't think that I want children. I certainly don't want children now. And it was a - it was a new relationship. We have only been seeing each other for probably three months.

OLSHER: So, it was an accident with birth control or without?

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN, A.R.A.: Without, without -it was an accident. Without.

OLSHER: Do you think that part of the reason that accident was able to happen was because the option of abortion existed for you?

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN, A.R.A.: Hmmm. Yes, I – I honestly thought I couldn't get pregnant. And it surprised me. I think many women think that they can't pregnant - "it won't happen to me."

OLSHER: Would you call that "abortion as birth control"?

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN, A.R.A.: No, I would not. I wouldn't - absolutely not. We knew - I was going on the pill. I could have waited. I - we - the timing, I mixed up the timing. And I feel like it was an honest mistake. You know, maybe I'm just telling myself that. I'm sure some people would say that. But I honestly believe it. I think that we made a mistake. Yeah.

OLSHER: Most people, according to polls, don't spend much time thinking about abortion - about the fact that America has the highest rate of any industrialized country that allows abortion, although the abortion rate has dropped in the last seven years. It's now at the lowest point it's been since 1975. Contraception is believed to be the main reason for the decline. Another possible reason is the greater acceptance today of single parenthood. At this Thriftway in Philadelphia, there are plenty of young people who have made the choice to keep babies, even though they weren't ready.

BUTCHIE LEBARRE (PH), ABORTION RIGHTS OPPONENT: It's wrong. It's plain and simple. It's just wrong.

OLSHER: Twenty-two-year-old Butchie LeBarre was waiting outside with his baby daughter Brooke sitting in a cart full of groceries.

LEBARRE: It's murder - that's how I feel about it. (SOUNDBITE OF BABY CRYING) I mean, you know, look at me? I'm only 22. I'm raising a kid. I - you know, people can do it. They just need to have faith in theirselves, and in their kids.

OLSHER: Was this a planned child?

LEBARRE: Oh, no. But I wasn't getting rid of her. That's about it, I guess, basically.

OLSHER: Although 40 percent of Americans say they do not agree with the provisions of Roe v. Wade, they aren't always as firm in their beliefs. Sometimes it gets hard to pin down even people who would first say they are absolutely against abortion.

JILL DELAPLANE (PH), OPPONENT OF ABORTION RIGHTS, IN GENERAL: I don't' believe in abortion.

OLSHER: What do you mean?

DELAPLANE: I mean, if you can lay down and have sex, you should be able -- if you're adult enough to have sex, you should be adult enough to pay the consequences.

OLSHER: Twenty-year-old Jill Delaplane was walking her baby daughter, Autumn, into the store in her stroller.

DELAPLANE: I think you only should have an abortion if you're raped or molested. And my boyfriend sticks by me 100 percent. I live with him and we both raise my daughter together. I didn't plan on getting pregnant. It was something that just happened, and I'm paying my dues now.

OLSHER: What if the baby is known to have birth defects?

DELAPLANE: So what? I mean, it depends on the birth defect. If you know your kid was born with AIDS, I wouldn't do it. If I was pregnant and I knew my kid would have AIDS, I really don't think I would have – have - you know, have my child. But I don't know - it depends on the circumstances.

OLSHER: This supermarket is just down the street from the Philadelphia neighborhood where Sharon McGee grew up, and where her mother died in an illegal abortion attempt 38 years ago. In large part because of that experience, McGee's attitudes embody a seeming paradox at the heart of many Americans' feelings about abortion - that it is murder, yet it also should be legal.

MCGEE: I am a practicing Catholic. I believe very much in the sanctity of life and all that, you know. My position is that yes it is a life, but it's easy for me, for instance, at this point in my life and how my life is, to say: "well no, I would never take a life." You know, and that would - I would hope to God I'd never be in that situation. But look at my - I mean, I look at my mother, you know. Did she ever think - did anybody ever think that she'd ever be in that position? No, and she was and she had to hit the ground running. And that's what she did.

OLSHER: Today, on the 25th anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe versus Wade decision, there will be activists arguing either for or against the right to have an abortion. The people they're trying to reach, though, like Sharon McGee, aren't so likely to see the issue in black and white. They know it's more complicated than that.