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Woman in a hospital bed reading a pamphlet called "After the Abortion."

Her “Health and Thus Her Life”

Abortion exceptions in legal history.
by Alicia Gutierrez-Romine via Perspectives on History on January 29, 2025
People on a porch in Fort Verde, Arizona, 1886.

Arizona’s 1864 Abortion Law Was Made in a Women’s Rights Desert – Here’s What Life Was Like Then

Abortions happened in Arizona, despite a near-complete abortion ban enacted in 1864. But people also faced penalties for them, including a female doctor who went to prison.
by Calvin Schermerhorn via The Conversation on April 25, 2024
An activist holding a placard that says Stop The War On Women during the protest in Los Angeles in 2019.
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History Shows Abortion Bans Are a War on Poor Women

While some liberals decry abortion bans as a war on women, history reveals that this charge distorts the reality of their impact.
by R. E. Fulton via Made By History on April 15, 2024
New York state legislator George Michaels thinks hard at his desk

Revisiting New York’s Historic Abortion Law in “Deciding Vote”

Jeremy Workman and Robert Lyons’s film reconstructs the passage of a 1970 law that made the state a sanctuary for people seeking abortions.
by Robert Lyons, Jeremy Workman, Linnea Feldman Emison via The New Yorker on November 29, 2023
Planned Parenthood center in Kentucky

The 113-Year-Old Law Behind Anti-Abortion Activists’ Latest Scheme

The Christian right is pushing a slate of laws to stop a new, vague offense they have dubbed “abortion trafficking.”
by Melissa Gira Grant via The New Republic on September 7, 2023
Beatrice Cogan, center, representing a criminal defendant in court.

The Grassroots of 'Roe'

My mother’s part in the 1970 repeal of New York’s abortion law is a lesson for today’s activists: all politics is local.
by Felicia Kornbluh via New York Review of Books on January 16, 2023
A protest sign raised in front of the Supreme Court, reading, "Keep abortion safe, legal, & accessible!"

The History of Abortion Law in the United States

The right to abortion has been both supported and contested throughout history.  When banned, abortions still occur, but legal restrictions make them less safe.
by Carrie N. Baker via Our Bodies Ourselves Today on August 12, 2022
Abortion rights advocates protest near the Supreme Court building in Washington on June 24.
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The 1960s Provide a Path For Securing Legal Abortion in 2022

How activists can secure legal abortion with a diverse all-of-the-above movement.
by Felicia Kornbluh via Made By History on June 25, 2022
Photograph of abortion pro-choice activists demonstrating outside the Supreme Court.
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Originalists are Misreading the Constitution’s Silence on Abortion

The originalist case for lifting abortion restrictions.
by Laura Briggs via Made By History on May 3, 2022
Abortion advocates marching in protest with signs

What Feminists Did the Last Time Abortion Was Illegal

How abortion activists responded in the wake of the 1989 Webster decision and what we can learn from their efforts.
by Michelle Moravec via Nursing Clio on December 14, 2021
A police officer stands with another officer in front of a house, as a hand holding a speculum appears in the foreground.

How Women Were Made to Suffer for Their Abortions Before Roe v. Wade

Interrogated, examined, blackmailed: how law enforcement treated abortion-seeking women before Roe.
by Leslie J. Reagan via Slate on September 10, 2021
Pro-abortion protests
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Before Roe v. Wade, U.S. Residents Sought Safer Abortions in Mexico

Transnational networks have long helped pregnant people navigate treatment options.
by Lina-Maria Murillo via Made By History on September 3, 2021

The History of Outlawing Abortion in America

Abortion was first criminalized in the mid 1900s amidst concerns that too many white women were ending their pregnancies.
by Nicola Beisel, Tamara Kay, Livia Gershon via JSTOR Daily on March 10, 2017

Abortion in American History

How do ideological debates on gender roles influence the abortion debate?
by Katha Pollitt via The Atlantic on May 1, 1997
Group of doctors in lab coats holding pro-choice signs outside the U.S. Supreme Court.
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Abortion Is More Than Health Care

Across the history of the U.S. abortion-rights movement, it has also been a matter of equality.
by Christen Hammock Jones via Made By History on December 9, 2024
Medicine chest.

The Trial That Sparked Maine's 1840 Abortion Statute

Maine passed its first abortion statute in 1840, not long after the pardon of Dr. Call. Could there be a connection?
by Patricia Cline Cohen via Commonplace on October 22, 2024
Left: Anthony Comstock. Right: Victoria Claflin Woodhull.
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The Comstock Act's Threat to Abortion Rights If Harris Loses

Anthony Comstock, Victoria Woodhull, and what a battle from the 1870s means for 2024 and reproductive rights.
by Rebecca DeWolf via Made By History on September 12, 2024
The Jersey Devil, a winged creature with horns and a goat-like head, amidst trees wrapped with vines.

Birthing the Jersey Devil

A mythical creature that lurks in the pinelands of New Jersey has served as a reminder of the horrors that result when reproductive freedoms are destroyed.
by Katherine Churchill via JSTOR Daily on July 3, 2024
Ronald Reagan campaigns in Houston ahead of the Republican Convention in 1976.
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How Abortion Took Over the Republican Party

Ronald Reagan proved instrumental to Southerners bringing their cultural conservatism to center stage for the Republican Party.
by Jonathan Bartho via Made By History on April 12, 2024
Demonstrators protest outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, March 26, 2024.

The Truth About the Comstock Act

The anti-obscenity law is unenforceable and probably unconstitutional. Conservatives still want to use it to ban medication abortions.
by Hassan Ali Kanu via The American Prospect on April 9, 2024
Women march for free abortion on demand.

Abortion On Demand

The surprising history of a politically charged phrase.
by Gillian Frank via The Revealer on April 4, 2024
An illustration of Anthony Comstock, published in Puck magazine in 1906.

The 150-Year-Old Comstock Act Could Transform the Abortion Debate

Once considered a relic of moral panics past, the 1873 law criminalized sending "obscene, lewd or lascivious" materials through the mail.
by Ellen Wexler via Smithsonian on June 15, 2023
Inventor of mifepristone Etienne-Emile Baulieu in lab

The Long and Winding History of the War on Abortion Drugs

While these pills are making headlines in the US, where a Texas judge tried to ban them, the story of their invention is often overlooked.
by Lara Bullens via France24 on April 26, 2023
Three demonstrators hold proabortion signs outside the federal courthouse in Amarillo, Tex. (David Erickson/AP)
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Abortion Pill Decision Reveals How the Debate Has Changed Since Dobbs

The medication abortion decision by a federal judge in Texas focused on the rights of fetuses and the interests of doctors — not the rights of women.
by Felicia Kornbluh via Made By History on April 10, 2023
US Airforce nurses treating patients.

The Better Roe: The Case of Struck v. Secretary of Defense

When Susan Struck fought being discharged for pregnancy from the US Air Force, it brought the right to choose into a different light.
by Kara Dixon Vuic via Perspectives on History on August 10, 2022
"Mademoiselle V...in the Costume of an Espada," by Edouard Manet, a painting of a woman dressed as a matador holding sword and cloth.

A Private Matter

Abortion and "The Scarlet Letter."
by Dana Medoro via Lapham’s Quarterly on August 3, 2022
Box of Mifepristone tablets
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Tennessee Republicans Turn to Mail Regulation to Restrict Abortion

This isn’t the first time the U.S. Postal Service has played a role in curbing women’s reproductive rights.
by Jane Marcellus via Made By History on May 25, 2022
Guinan Phillips, 31, attends a candlelit memorial for victims of the mass shooting at Tops supermarket in Buffalo. (Heather Ainsworth for The Washington Post)
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The Tie Between the Buffalo Shooting and Banning Abortion

The two may seem unconnected, but a centuries-long history of panic about White birth rates binds them together.
by Mytheli Sreenivas via Made By History on May 20, 2022
Lithograph of Sir Matthew Hale

On Roe, Alito Cites a Judge Who Treated Women as Witches and Property

Sir Matthew Hale, a 17th-century jurist, has been endlessly quoted by American judges and lawyers, with awful repercussions for women.
by Jill Elaine Hasday via Washington Post on May 9, 2022
Anti-abortion protestors and police in front of Supreme Court
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The Anti-Abortion Movement’s Powerful Use of Language Paid Off

Nearing an antiabortion victory five decades in the making.
by Jennifer L. Holland via Made By History on May 5, 2022
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