Supreme Court's conservatives lean towards limiting abortion rights after dramatic oral arguments on Mississippi law banning abortions after 15 weeks

The Supreme Court seemed poised Wednesday to uphold a Mississippi law that bars abortion after 15 weeks, but it is less clear if there is a clear majority to end the right to abortion nationwide, although conservative justices expressed skepticism about the landmark Roe v. Wade decision.

The dispute represents the culmination of a decades-long effort on the part of critics of the landmark opinion that legalized abortion nationwide to return the issue to the states, a move that would almost immediately eviscerate abortion rights in large swaths of the South and the Midwest.

Chief Justice John Roberts seemed to be looking for a middle ground to allow states to ban abortion earlier -- moving up the viability line from the current 22 to 23 weeks -- but leaving in place some remnants of a woman's right to end an abortion. He said 15 weeks was not a "dramatic departure" from viability.