Abortion In The 1800s

Abortion Abortion is a topic that seems to be out of our hands now after the hard fought battles by our passed generation. Until the mid-1800 abortions were legal and totally available in the United States. During that time the newly formed “American medical association” began a campaign to professionalize medicine and banned “quackery”, who was people that performed abortion and women birth control for centuries. During the second half of the 19th century the Victorian Society condemned women who wanted to get abortion and called them selfish, and called them people who wanted to avoid a mother’s duty. During that time the legislation restricting abortion spread rapidly, both abortion and birth control was illegal in most of the States. As an example of one of the specific laws issued during that time is the Texas Statutes on Abortion .

Just before the historic case of Roe v. Wade, Bill Baird took his stage and argued for the legalization of contraception of unmarried women. Before this case, contraception used by unmarried women was illegal, but the courted turned down the Massachusetts law prohibiting the use of contraceptive. The Supreme Court ruled that they violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution. This case just changed the law in terms of the use of contraception, but there is a case that changed the whole dynamics of the abortion rule. Case fought by Sarah Weddington named “Roe v. Wade is the historic Supreme Court decision overturning a Texas interpretation of abortion law and making abortion legal in the United States.” The decision of the Supreme Court’s ruling was based on the ninth and the fourteenth Amendment to the United States