Filling the vacant U.S. Supreme Court seat is a matter of urgency in these tumultuous times, but it is also one demanding cautious and careful consideration. Although many Democrats remain angry over the Republicans’ refusal to consider Barack Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, it is time to examine closely what Neil Gorsuch might bring to the bench.

Gorsuch’s confirmation hearings began Monday.

Comparisons between Gorsuch and the late Antonin Scalia have dominated media analysis, particularly with regard to the deceased justice’s passion for originalism, the practice of looking back to the time and philosophy of the Constitution’s framers to interpret the document’s meaning, even as applied to the modern era.

Originalism is particularly significant when analyzing claims related to fundamental rights such as abortion that, although they do not appear in the text of the Constitution, the court has held to be part of its substantive due process guarantee.

As we have seen through a series of decisions regarding abortion rights, it is not necessary to overrule the seminal 1973 case of Roe v. Wade in order to erode abortion rights to the extent that they exist only as a formal legal doctrine while, as a practical matter, most women lack access to them.

For example, there are presently 46 bills seeking to limit abortion rights pending in 14 states, including “personhood” bills granting rights to fetuses from the moment of conception and laws prohibiting abortions after 20 weeks based on an unsubstantiated medical claim that fetuses experience pain after that point.

These types of laws shift the focus from women’s rights to fetal rights in a way that disrupts Roe v. Wade’s careful balancing between these two competing concerns. They also threaten to lead the court to a decision that would eliminate women’s rights from consideration altogether.

Gorsuch already has demonstrated that he favors religious expression over women’s right to control their bodies by joining the original Hobby Lobby decision, which allowed a national chain craft store corporation to refuse to fund contraception for its female employees despite a federal mandate to do so in the Affordable Care Act.

This decision was particularly alarming because it attributed the religious freedom rights that trumped women’s need for birth control to a corporation as a “person.”

Equally troubling was Gorsuch’s characterization of contraception as a drug or device that “can have the effect of destroying a fertilized egg” when in fact most birth control merely prevents fertilization.

The nomination of Neil Gorsuch may thus represent an effort to fulfill President Donald Trump’s campaign promise to overturn Roe v. Wade “automatically” by appointing only “pro-life” justices to the court.

Even if it is, however, there is no guarantee that this endeavor will succeed. The federal court’s imposition of an injunction temporarily halting Trump’s attempt to deliver a Muslim ban to his supporters proved that the Constitution and the judiciary’s interpretation of it remain formidable checks on the exercise of executive authority. Gorsuch’s reaction to Trump’s subsequent attack on the judge and court involved might indicate his commitment to judicial independence.

Nonetheless, Gorsuch’s nomination may lead to an unacceptable constriction of women’s rights.

Andrea Freeman is an assistant professor in the William S. Richardson School of Law.