ROCK HILL, S.C. Former Vice President Mike Pence , a likely candidate to seek the presidency in 2024, said Thursday he hopes the five justices named in a draft majority opinion have the courage of their convictions to overturn the case that created a constitutional right to abortion.

Pence was speaking to several hundred congregants at Lakewood Baptist Church for a National Day of Prayer service, and his call came after asking for prayers for all federal elected leaders and members of the Supreme Court.

And lets especially pray that the five justices listed in the majority opinion leaked this week will have the courage of their convictions to right a historic wrong, he said to loud applause.

To reporters afterward, Pence said he hopes the expected decision gives the country a fresh start on life, and suggested that he would not support a national law banning abortion, should Republicans take control of Congress this autumn.

The decision by the Supreme Court will not only overturn Roe versus Wade, but it will return the question on this profound moral issue to the states and the American people where it belongs, he said. I really do believe when it comes to issues that are closest and nearest and dearest to American people like the sanctity of human life, that those are best decided by the people and their elected representatives.

He declined to answer a follow-up question regarding a federal law applying everywhere, but said that he would, if the court overturned Roe, push for state laws restricting abortion. Well be working in states around the country to advance the cause of life once they do, he said.

Several hours later at a fundraising dinner for the Carolina Pregnancy Center in Spartanburg, Pence again told reporters that abortion bans should be done at the state, not federal, level. State governments closest to the people I think are best equipped to fashion legislation advancing the sanctity of life and where people can have a fulsome debate about such a profound moral question, he said.

Pence has been an outspoken abortion opponent for decades, and, as vice president, was his former bosss emissary to anti-abortion groups. He has continued that advocacy since leaving office last year, with high-profile speeches and even a friend-of-the-court brief from his nonprofit group in the Mississippi case that appears likely to reverse the constitutional protection for abortion created by Roe v. Wade.

Pence had scheduled the trip well before a leaked draft Supreme Court opinion that would overturn Roe was published by Politico this week, according to his aides. The visit is his fifth to South Carolina since leaving office.