As early as the 1600s abortion has been a common practice around the world and women used many different methods in order to perform abortions. During the colonial period in America many people performed abortions, but whether they were legal or not depended on the countries that had control of the specific colonies. In the early 1800s, after the United States had gained independence from their colonizers and created a nation of their own, abortions in general were not not illegal. Although they were highly stigmatized and considered socially unacceptable there were no direct laws against abortions in many states. The American Medical Association was founded in 1847 and had been fighting for laws against abortions since their founding. Their motivation for being against had many factors that contributed to it. One factor was that physicians at the time were required to take an oath, called the Hippocratic Oath, that holds them to ethical standards and the Hippocratic Oath specifically states that they should not perform abortions. Another factor was the medical risks of the procedure and whether the procedure should be considered as harming the unborn baby. These factors and many others came together to cause the American Medical Association to take a firm stance against abortions. …show more content…
The Catholic Church openly opposed the CCS and would excommunicate any members who went against them and supported the CCS. Even though they were supposed to be strongly opposed to abortions, some members of the Catholic Church were sympathetic with women who wanted to get abortions and sympathetic with the cause of the CCS. Very few of these members of the Catholic Church actually made a public effort to support abortions because they knew the repercussions that would causes for them, but many secretly supported the CCS and some were even members of the