Missouri women officially became second-class citizens Friday morning. With the U.S. Supreme Court's decision overturning Roe v. Wade, a state law took effect outlawing almost all abortions from the moment of conception, even for rape or incest victims. For the first time in almost half a century, citizens of Missouri and at least 15 other states will be divided by law into two levels of citizenship: Those who have the right to fully control what happens inside their own bodies, and those who are to be denied that right by the state.

It is imperative now that protests by pro-choice activists, in Missouri and nationally, remain peaceful and focused on the only legitimate response: Anti-choice politicians must be defeated in state legislative and congressional races wherever possible in the coming midterms if women are to have any possibility of regaining their right to biological autonomy. The adage that elections have consequences has seldom been more starkly confirmed.

Roe, of course, was the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision that established a constitutional right to abortion until a fetus could viably live outside the womb (about 24 weeks). The court's reasoning then was that the Constitution bestows a fundamental right to privacy on its citizens. The current court's rejection of that premise could affect Americans' lives in yet-unimagined ways that go far beyond the abortion issue. There are already indications the next battle could be over the right to birth control.

The current court's decision in the Mississippi case of Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization was foreseen almost two months ago with the unprecedented leak of a draft opinion, but 6-3 final opinion issued Friday was nonetheless a jarring reminder of the overtly partisan turn the high court has taken. The justices could have upheld Mississippi's ban on abortions after 15 weeks without overturning Roe entirely. But they made the deliberate decision to reach beyond the case in front of them to engineer a more sweeping outcome — an outcome that polls show two-thirds of Americans oppose. The effect on the court's already-low standing in the eyes of the nation may never recover.

All six in the majority have at various times expressed their reverence for precedent and their aversion to judicial activism. The three appointees of former President Donald Trump confirmed those beliefs directly to the Senate in their relatively recent confirmation hearings. Yet as soon as the opportunity arose, all voted to eviscerate what two generations of women have viewed as a fundamental right of self-determination.

Justice Samuel Alito's opinion was steeped in the harsh rhetoric of ideological certainty, declaring Roe "egregiously wrong and on a collision course with the Constitution from the day it was decided." He even likened it to one the most shameful opinions in the court's history, Plessy v. Ferguson — thus informing the women of America that allowing them agency over their own bodies is as indefensible as racial segregation.

Within minutes after the court's decision was announced, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt formally certified that Roe had been overturned, thus triggering Missouri's complete ban on abortions except in medical emergencies. Schmitt — a Republican running for the U.S. Senate with a campaign that has blatantly pandered to the extremist right — then took to Twitter to boast that Missouri was the first state in the nation to completely ban the procedure.

The immediate effects here and in other anti-choice states are tragically predictable, based on the experience in states that prohibited abortion prior to Roe. The ruling will land most harshly on low-income women who don't have the resources to travel to pro-choice states. Some will resort to illegal and dangerous self-administered or back-alley abortions. Some will die.

But that isn't likely all of it. Not in today's radicalized political climate.

The anti-choice movement appears unlikely to take this victory and go home, what with a majority of states still protecting abortion rights. Calls for a national abortion ban have been growing on the right lately, and Friday's opinion will only further fuel that idea. With Republicans likely to re-take Congress in the midterms and possibly the White House in 2024, it's a real possibility.

Meanwhile, red states' newly imposed abortion bans are almost certain to become ever more draconian, as Republican officeholders try to blunt electoral challenges from the right. Hints at what might await are already out there. Missouri lawmakers last session seriously considered a measure that would have censored abortion information for Missouri women, tracked them if they sought out-of-state abortions, and punished out-of-state providers. At least one Missouri lawmaker this year suggested abortion should be a death-penalty offense.

On whom would that or other new sanctions fall? The new Missouri law punishes only abortion providers (with up to 15 years in prison) but doesn't punish the woman — a deliberate public-relations strategy of the anti-choice movement that may now fall by the wayside with the achievement of its biggest goal. Most Americans probably aren't ready for the sight of rape victims being imprisoned (or worse) for desperately seeking to end the pregnancy. But if there's one thing that was made clear Friday, it's that the anti-choice movement and its allies in Congress and on the Supreme Court aren't concerned about what most Americans want on this issue.

Elections have consequences. The "Handmaid's Tale" moment that is now upon America is the consequence of the nation's pro-choice majority prioritizing other issues when they vote — or just not voting at all. Pro-choice voters in Missouri and in much of the nation have a difficult task ahead, but not an impossible one. Missouri's primaries are Aug. 2. The general election is Nov. 8. Don't just complain. Don't just post. Don't just march. Vote.

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