Abortion in the United States

Evangelical Christians were initially generally either supportive or indifferent to Roe — citing what they saw as a lack of biblical condemnation on the matter, its perceived affirmation of religious liberty, and furthering of non-intrusive government — but by the 1980s began to join anti-abortion Catholics to overturn the decision.

[50] Founding Father and Second President of the United States John Adams praised the Spartan lawgiver Lycurgus for refusing his sister-in-law from having an abortion even though it prevented him from assuming power.

[42][66][67] In The Revolution, a newspaper operated by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, an 1869 opinion piece was published arguing that instead of merely attempting to pass a law against abortion, the root cause must also be addressed.

[70] The free love wing of the feminist movement refused to advocate for abortion and treated the practice as an example of the hideous extremes to which modern marriage was driving women.

Some states included provisions allowing for abortion in limited circumstances, generally to protect the woman's health or to terminate pregnancies arising from rape or incest.

In 1966, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops assigned Monsignor James T. McHugh to document efforts to reform abortion laws, and anti-abortion groups began forming in various states in 1967.

When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer."

Instead, it chose to point out that historically, under English and American common law and statutes, "the unborn have never been recognized ... as persons in the whole sense", and thus the fetuses are not legally entitled to the protection afforded by the right to life specifically enumerated in the Fourteenth Amendment.

[111] Under Roe v. Wade, state governments may not prohibit late terminations of pregnancy when "necessary to preserve the life or health of the mother", even if it would cause the demise of a viable fetus.

[112] This rule was clarified by the 1973 judicial decision Doe v. Bolton, which specifies "that the medical judgment may be exercised in the light of all factors—physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman's age—relevant to the well-being of the patient".

[113][114][115] It is by this provision for the mother's mental health that women in the U.S. legally choose abortion after viability when screenings reveal abnormalities that do not cause a baby to die shortly after birth.

[116][117][118][119] In the 1992 case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the Court abandoned Roe's strict trimester framework but maintained its central holding that women have a right to choose to have an abortion before viability.

[123] The Supreme Court granted certiorari to Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization in May 2021, a case that challenges the impact of Roe v. Wade in blocking enforcement of a 2018 Mississippi law (the Gestational Age Act) that had banned any abortions after the first 15 weeks.

John Roberts, the Chief Justice of the United States, concurred in the decision to uphold the law at question as constitutional, by a 6–3 vote, and did not support overruling both Roe and Casey.

[161] In light of the Dobbs decision, the Alliance Defending Freedom launched a lawsuit in November 2022 in the Northern District of Texas under Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk to seek to overturn the FDA's original approval of mifepristone.

[163] Kacsmaryk's ruling was partially reversed by a panel on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, leaving mifepristone on the market but reverting efforts made by the FDA to liberalize its use over seven years.

[171] As of 2006[update], the youngest child to survive a premature birth in the United States was a girl born at Kapiolani Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, at 21 weeks and 3 days gestation.

[178] Legal experts cited as a potentially persuasive precedent the 2014 district decision in Zogenix v. Patrick, in which the court ruled that under the doctrine of federal preemption, Massachusetts could not ban the opioid Zohydro because it had been approved by the FDA.

In 2019, New York passed the Reproductive Health Act (RHA), which repealed a pre-Roe provision that banned third-trimester abortions except in cases where the continuation of the pregnancy endangered a pregnant woman's life.

[238] The next day, Alabama governor Kay Ivey signed the bill into law, primarily as a symbolic gesture in hopes of challenging Roe v. Wade in the Supreme Court.

[239][240] Since Alabama introduced the first modern anti-abortion legislation in April 2019, five other states have also adopted abortion laws including Mississippi, Kentucky, Ohio, Georgia and most recently Louisiana on May 30, 2019.

[269] Legal challenges on behalf of abortion providers, many of which were represented by the American Civil Liberties Union and Planned Parenthood, successfully stopped most of the orders on a temporary basis.

[336] A January 2003 CBS News/The New York Times poll examined whether Americans thought abortion should be legal or not, and found variations in opinion which depended upon party affiliation and the region of the country.

A Rasmussen Reports poll four days after the Supreme Court's opinion in Gonzales v. Carhart found that 40% of respondents "knew the ruling allowed states to place some restrictions on specific abortion procedures."

The abortion-rights movement in the United States initially emphasized the national policy benefits of abortion, such as smaller welfare expenses, slower population growth, and fewer illegitimate births.

[365] On January 28, 2021, President Joe Biden signed a Presidential Memorandum that repealed the restoration of Mexico City policy and also called for the United States Department of Health and Human Services to "suspend, rescind or revoke" restrictions made to Title X.

The order was to stay in place until U.S. District Judge Daniel Porter Jordan III could review newly drafted rules on how the Mississippi Department of Health would administer a new abortion law.

"[385] For the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization case,[386] which confirmed the May 2022 leaks obtained by Politico and overruled Roe and Planned Parenthood v. Casey in June 2022,[387][388][389] among the over 130 amici curiae briefs, hundreds of scientists provided evidence, data, and studies, in particular the Turnaway Study, in favor of abortion rights and to rebuke arguments made to the Court that abortion "has no beneficial effect on women's lives and careers—and might even cause them harm".

[80] AHA and OAH jointly issued a statement against the Supreme Court's decision, which was reported by Anchorage Daily News,[395] Inside Higher Ed,[396] Insight Into Diversity,[397] and the Strict Scrutiny podcast from Crooked Media,[398] saying they have "declined to take seriously the historical claims of our [amicus curiae] brief".

Joined by at least 30 other academic and scholarly institutions, they condemned "the court's misinterpretation about the history of legalized abortion" and said it has "the potential to exacerbate historic injustices and deepen inequalities in our country".