Few decisions are more personal and intimate, more properly private, or more basic to individual dignity and autonomy, than a woman's decision whether to end her pregnancy. A woman's right to make that choice freely is fundamental. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun, Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists (1986)
Securing a woman’s right make her own reproductive health choices has been a long struggle that promises to continue for years to come. Although abortion was not a crime in this country until the mid-1800’s, at the end of the century it was banned in every state. By 1930, an estimated 800,000 back-alley abortions were taking place annually, resulting in death for between 8,000 and 17,000 mothers each year. The terrible suffering of tens of thousands of women and their families moved early reformers to call for the legalization of abortion. A major breakthrough for reproductive rights occurred in 1965 when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Griswold v. Connecticut that a ban on contraception violated the constitutional right to marital privacy. That decision opened the door for other landmark cases in the 1960s and 1970s that established reproductive freedom as a fundamental right grounded in the privacy protections of the U.S. Constitution. When the Supreme Court announced its landmark 1973 ruling legalizing abortion in Roe v. Wade, the backlash against women’s right to choose was swift and fierce. The anti-choice movement has worked for decades to ban abortion rights, and even to restrict access to contraception and information about reproductive health. Realizing that a complete ban on abortion is unacceptable to the majority of Americans, the anti-choice movement has shifted its focus to slowly chiseling away at reproductive rights through incremental restrictions on access to contraception and abortion. Many of these efforts target society’s most vulnerable populations: low-income women and teenagers. More than 35 years after Roe v. Wade, the right to choose continues to face constant assaults. If you feel your rights have been violated, call our complaint line at 314-652-3111 or File a Complaint with our office.
|
