In this entry, the first of a three-part discussion - we will focus on abortion and the individual’s right to choose whether they want to carry a child to term in their body. We should also be clear that this choice isn't just about using abortion as a method or a means of controlling birth AKA birth control, this choice has larger implications on the health of the person carrying the child. Let's dig in, let's look at the world of reproductive rights at the birth of our nation and let's follow those rights, particularly the right to choose, watching the ebb and flow until we get to the decision in Roe v. Wade.
Here is the too long, didn’t read version that sums everything up:
The United States began as a nation with unregulated but legal abortions being practiced, and common. Midwives, not doctors, were responsible for women’s reproductive health. Women were trusted to make decisions about their bodies and male doctors focused on other areas of medicine. At the turn of the 20th century, the United States had become a nation that had criminalized abortion, placed male doctors as the experts in women’s reproductive health, causing women across the nation to seek dangerous, and often deadly abortions outside of the confines of the law.
Let’s start off with a couple definitions so that we are all on the same page.
The National Institute for Health (NIH) defines reproductive health as, “the condition of male and female reproductive systems during all life stages.” They define reproductive systems as, “organs and hormone-producing glands, including the pituitary gland in the brain. Ovaries in females and testicles in males are reproductive organs, or gonads, that maintain the health of their respective systems.”
Essentially, the definition describes the ability for humanity to reproduce.
We have definitions of reproductive health and reproductive systems. What about reproductive rights?
The World Health Organization
Who defines reproductive rights as, “the rights of an individual to make decisions regarding reproduction and reproductive health.”
Essentially, the right of the individual to decide how they want to maintain their ability to reproduce.
Together, these definitions paint a picture where reproductive rights affect everyone. Yes, this series will focus on abortion rights specifically, but that’s not the only thing that matters when discussing reproductive health. I say this because I want to make sure that we are all on the same page, that we all understand that reproductive rights and reproductive health is not just about the right of anyone that can carry a child to decide whether they want to carry that child to term.
Reproductive rights are very broad.
For example, if you choose to abstain, reproductive rights includes your right to remain celibate.
Reproductive rights also include the right to be promiscuous, the right to wear a condom, the right to use birth control or any other form of contraceptive, the right to seek a sperm donor or an egg donor, and even the right to determine whether an individual wants to carry out a procedure that, in medical terms, would leave them sterile and unable to reproduce.
Every one of these rights, at some point in our nation's history were challenged, taken away, and restored to the people.
At the birth of our nation, abortion was not just legal, it was a safe, condoned, and frequently practiced procedure in colonial America it was common enough to appear in the legal and medical records of the period (Dine, 2013).
In the early days of our nation, extramarital sex, and adultery were illegal; while the churches of the time frowned on abortion, it was because they viewed abortions as evidence of illicit or premarital sex instead of murder (Blakemore, 2022).
It wasn't until around 1821 that the first abortion law appeared on the books (Dine, 2013). These early anti-abortion laws made it illegal to abort a pregnancy after the quickening, that time when a woman first felt the baby move. Due to the difficulty to prove such cases, given that only the woman could testify as to feeling the child moving, these laws were rarely prosecuted and resulted in a misdemeanor violation when they were (Holland, 2016).
Abortion before the quickening was not outlawed until the 1860s (Dine, 2013) nearly 100 years after the birth of our nation. That is not to say that abortion cases didn’t exist: in the 1740’s prosecutors tried a doctor and a Connecticut man in connection with the death of a woman named Sarah Grosvenor, who died as a result of a failed abortion (Blakemore, 2022).
The trial focused on the failure of the men conducting the abortion and not the fact that an abortion had taken place.
In the 19th century, women had great control over matters of the house, particularly rich white women, who’s strictly defined roles held that the home and issues of reproductive health were a woman’s realm (Blakemore, 2022).
It was women, not doctors, who passed down knowledge about pregnancy, childbirth, and reproductive control (Blakemore, 2022). Between the late 1700’s and early to mid 1800’s, gynecological examinations were acceptable only when conducted by a woman, specifically a female midwife (Zoila Acevedo RN, 1979). (Stone, 2022).
The mid 1800’s saw many significant changes, two of which had a massive impact on the direction of reproductive rights in the United States. The first change was the Second Great Awakening, which brought to light the notion that a person could be “born again” and the concept that life begins at conception.
Prior to the 1840’s the idea that life began at conception was a Catholic notion but was adopted by Protestants during the Second Great Awakening” (Blakemore, 2022).
The second change was the rise of the American Medical Association (AMA). In the early years of the AMA, the organization took the position that the fetus was a person from conception (Blakemore, 2022).
The Second Great Awakening, the rise of the AMA, loss of life as a result of the American Civil War, and decreasing Caucasian birth rates, spurred the adoption of anti-abortion laws nationwide. There are multiple theories among historians as to the reason for the AMA’s position on abortion, many believe that the male dominated AMA worked to discredit their competition through the passing of anti-abortion laws (Stone, 2022). Messaging during that time established the idea that doctors, not midwives, had a superior understanding of embryos and the female body and thus doctors, not midwives should be the authority on abortion and childbirth (Welch, 2022).
A group of doctors, backed by the AMA, catholic church, and sensationalist newspapers drove a campaign that pushed for the criminalization of abortion (Dine, 2013) and by 1900, the United States had transitioned from a nation without abortion laws to a nation in which abortion was “legally and officially prescribed” (Blakemore, 2022). A decade later, every state in the nation had anti-abortion laws with exceptions for pregnancies that endangered the life of the mother (Welch, 2022). After that, abortion in the United States was outlawed until Roe v. Wade.
This is where the definition of reproductive health comes into play. Simply because abortion was outlawed did not mean that abortions stopped. Physicians discretely offered under-the-table surgical abortions to those who could afford their services, while those who could not, used old herbal recipes, douched with chemicals like Lysol, and even attempted to remove the fetuses on their own (Blakemore, 2022). According to research by the Guttmacher Institute, in the 1930’s illegal abortions accounted for 1 in 5 maternal deaths, by 1965 illegal abortions accounted for 17% of all maternal deaths (Welch, 2022). Anti-abortion laws did not improve the lives of American women, instead they made the lives of women worse by interfering with their reproductive health and forcing women to seek alternative methods to end unwanted and sometimes dangerous pregnancies.
Next up - the second part of this discussion will focus on what the decision in Roe meant for reproductive health in America, and how the rights that decision granted were regulated state by state until finally coming to the Dobbs decision in 2022.
Works Cited
Blakemore, E. (2022, May 17). History and Culture. Retrieved from National Geographic: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/th-complex-early-history-of-abortion-in-the-united-states
Dine, R. (2013, August 8). Retrieved from Center For American Progress: https://www.americanprogress.org/article/scarlet-letters-getting-the-history-of-abortion-and-contraception-right
Holland, J. L. (2016). Organization of American Historians. Retrieved from The American Historian: https://www.oah.org/tah/issues/2016/november/abolishing-abortion-the-history-of-the-pro-life-movement-in-america/
Stone, G. R. (2022, June 24). A History of American Thought on Abortion: It's Not What You Think. (J. Dailey, Interviewer) Christian Science Monitor.
Welch, A. (2022, March 13). The History of Abortion Rights in the U.S. Retrieved from healthline.com: https://www.healthline.com/health-news/the-history-of-abortion-rights-in-the-u-s
Zoila Acevedo RN, P. (1979). Abortion in Early America. Women & Health, 4(2), 159-167.
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