Body Blog

Historically, women around the world have tried to end their unplanned pregnancies whether abortion is legal or not, often putting in risk their own safety and health by self-inducing or seeking a dangerous illegal procedure. Estimates of the annual number of illegal abortions in the United States during the 1950s and 1960s range from 200,000 to 1.2 million. Prior to Roe v. Wade, as many as 5,000 American women died annually as a direct result of unsafe abortions. Today, abortion is one of the most commonly performed clinical procedures in the United States, and the death rate from abortion is extremely low: 0.6 per 100,000 procedures. 

Abortion Laws In The 1800s

In the mid-to-late 1800s states began passing laws that made abortion illegal. The motivations for anti-abortion laws were different from state to state. One of the reasons included fears that the population would be dominated by the children of newly arriving immigrants, whose birth rates were higher than those of "native" Anglo-Saxon women. All medical practices during the 1800s were extremely risky, all surgical procedures, including abortion, Hospitals were not common during these times and antiseptics were unknown, and even the most respected known doctors had only some medical educations. Without today's current technology, maternal and infant mortality rates during childbirth were extraordinarily high. The dangers from abortion were similar to the dangers from other surgeries that were not outlawed. 

Legalization in the Late 1960s  

Between 1967 and 1973 one-third of the state’s liberalized or repealed their criminal abortion laws. However, the right to have an abortion in all states was only made available to American women in 1973 when the Supreme Court struck down the remaining restrictive state laws with its ruling in Roe v. Wade. The 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade made it possible for women to get safe, legal abortions from well-trained medical practitioners. This led to dramatic decreases in pregnancy-related injury and death. Roe v. Wade ruled unconstitutional a state law that banned abortions except to save the life of the mother. The Court ruled that the states were forbidden from outlawing or regulating any aspect of abortion performed during the first trimester of pregnancy, could only pass abortion regulations reasonably related to maternal health in the second and third trimesters, and could pass abortion laws protecting the life of the fetus only in the third trimester. Even then an exception had to be made to protect the life of the mother. Controversial from the moment it was released Roe v. Wade politically divided the nation more than any other recent case and continues to inspire heated debates, politics, and even violence today. Though by no means the Supreme Court's most important decision, Roe v. Wade remains it’s most recognized.

Today

Studies from June 2013 show that out of the fifty states there are still nineteen states where abortion is completely illegal. All this is interesting to me because I see how people have felt about abortion throughout the years and how some things have changed. I feel that every woman should have the choice about what they should do about their own pregnancy. No one should have the right to tell a woman she has to have a kid because they are not the ones who are going to birth the baby or raise the child. This issue intersects with my own body because I want to know that I have to choice to have an abortion if that was what I felt was necessary. 

Works Cited
"Abortion Laws Worldwide." Women on Waves. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 May 2014. 
Krishnan, Shweta. "The Hegemony Of The Male Doctor." The ASAP Blog. N.p., 7 May 2013. Web. 02 May 2014. 
Press, Kevin Mcgill Associated. "Court Hears Arguments on Mississippi Abortion Law." ABC News. ABC News Network, 28 Apr. 2014. Web. 02 May 2014. 
"Roe v. Wade (1973)." PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2014.
Sullivan, Sean. "Where All 50 States Stand on Abortion, in Two Charts." Washington Post. The Washington Post, 07 Mar. 2013. Web. 02 May 2014.