In 1973, it became the state affiliate of the Washington, D.C.–based National Right to Life Committee in response to the Supreme Court decision of Roe v. Wade which legalized abortion.

Its activities include education, legislation, and political action to oppose legalized abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, human cloning and artificially produced genetic transformation.

"[4] For the 1996 United States presidential election, GRTL president Gen Wilson mentioned Alan Keyes as a personal favorite, while also acknowledging that "realistically, you have to be pragmatic.

"[5] In 2000, president-elect Caryl Swift disqualified candidates who held an abortion exception in favor of rape and incest victims from receiving an endorsement from GRTL.

In the 2002 U.S. Senate election, GRTL initially endorsed Republicans Saxby Chambliss and Bob Irvin, who had claimed to only support abortions in cases where the mother's life is at risk.

[7][8] For the 2006 Georgia state elections, GRTL endorsed several Republicans, including Casey Cagle, Ralph E. Reed Jr., Gary Black, Brian Kemp and Sonny Perdue, as well as Democrat Walter Ray.

[a] Under Becker's leadership, the organization lobbied for restrictions on abortion, including the Human Life Amendment which would have defined personhood as beginning at fertilization, to be added to the Georgia Constitution.

This would assure that regardless of race, age, degree of disability, manner of conception or circumstances surrounding a terminal illness, that the civil rights of the pre-born at an embryonic or fetal level, the elderly and those with mental or physical infirmities are protected by law and are violated when we allow destructive embryonic stem cell research, therapeutic or reproductive cloning, animal-human hybrids, abortion (except to save the life of the mother), infanticide, euthanasia or assisted suicide.

[27] Republican candidate Karen Handel, who opposed abortions with exceptions for rape and incest, was described by GRTL as being "extremely liberal" on the issue.

[33] Georgia Right to Life repeatedly opposed legislation that sought to ban abortions with exceptions for rape and incest, with anti-abortion critics denouncing GRTL's aggressive "all-or-nothing" approach.

In 2010, GRTL promoted an outreach campaign aimed towards the state's African-American women, whose pregnancies were aborted at a disproportionately high rate.

[46] GRTL's campaign also included screenings of the Life Dynamics documentary film Maafa 21, which alleged that white elites had used abortions to control black population growth since the end of slavery.