After the war, Morgentaler migrated to Canada and entered medical practice, becoming one of the first Canadian doctors to perform vasectomies, to insert intrauterine devices, and to provide birth control pills to unmarried women.

[3] In 2008, Morgentaler was awarded the Order of Canada "for his commitment to increased health care options for women, his determined efforts to influence Canadian public policy and his leadership in humanist and civil liberties organizations.

[16] He started as a general practitioner in 1955 but increasingly specialized in family planning, becoming one of the first Canadian doctors to perform vasectomies, to insert intra-uterine devices, and to provide birth control pills to unmarried women.

[17] On October 17, 1967, he presented a brief on behalf of the Humanist Association of Canada before a House of Commons Health and Welfare Committee that was investigating the issue of illegal abortion.

Robert Malcolm Campbell and Leslie Alexander Pal wrote, "Henry Morgentaler experienced the [abortion] law's limitations directly in the supplications of desperate women who visited his Montreal office.

[29] In 1975, under Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, the Canadian Parliament changed the law so that an appeals court could not overturn a jury acquittal, although they could order a new trial.

[3] It was reported that the Liberal Justice Minister for Quebec, Jérôme Choquette, was deeply involved and interested in prosecuting Morgentaler until he was removed from the portfolio.

On December 11, 1976, the new Justice Minister, Marc-André Bédard, dropped the charges against Morgentaler and other doctors and announced that there would be no further trials for clinic abortions in Quebec.

The group also supported Morgentaler's use of vacuum aspiration under local anesthetic as safer and less invasive than the dilation and curettage (D&C) that was traditionally performed at hospitals for abortions or after miscarriages.

[30] By this point, the tide of public opinion had turned in Morgentaler's favour: A Gallup poll in 1983 showed that 72% of Canadians believed that the decision to abort should rest solely with a pregnant woman and her doctor.

The courts also reviewed various attempts by provinces and municipalities to use laws about medical services to restrict or hamper the ability of pregnant women to exercise a right of choice.

It rejected the argument that the Supreme Court's 1988 decision in R. v. Morgentaler prohibited provinces from passing laws that simply made clinic abortions illegal.

This was, in essence, the reason that Quebec juries would not convict him: Have all these people forgotten that women used to die in our countries from self-induced or quack abortions, that unwanted children were given away to institutions where they suffered enormous trauma that took the joy of life away from them and made them into anxious, depressed individuals with a grudge against society?

[49] Morgentaler's final legal battles focused on obtaining universal public funding for abortions, by gaining recognition that a well-regulated specialist clinic provides a service equivalent to that offered in a hospital.

In New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, for example, the provincial health care system paid for abortions only if they were performed at authorized hospitals and approved by two physicians.

[50] Judge Paulette Garnett said that Morgentaler should have legal standing to proceed with the lawsuit because the personal nature of abortions – and the fact the procedures are time-sensitive – make it difficult for women to take the government before the courts.

[55] In May 1992, the Morgentaler Clinic on Harbord Street in Toronto was firebombed during the night by two people (caught on security camera) using gasoline as fuel and a firework to set off the explosion.

The government wanted to gather information about activities by anti-abortion sympathizers; at the time, law enforcement agencies in Canada did not collect statistics about harassment and violence against abortion providers, their clinics, or their clients.

[56] After sniper attacks on other doctors such as Garson Romalis and Hugh Short, abortion providers in Canada were aware that their own lives could be in danger from anti-abortion assassins with high-powered rifles.

"[58] In 1976, the Disciplinary Committee of the Professional Corporation of Physicians of Quebec suspended Morgentaler's medical licence for a year as a result of his conviction for having performed an illegal abortion.

[61] In 1973, on the basis of Morgentaler's public statements that he had performed thousands of abortions, the Quebec Ministry of Revenue ordered him to pay $354,799 in unpaid income taxes.

12,000 signatures were acquired on a petition asking the UWO to reverse its decision to honour Morgentaler and several protest rallies were held, including one on the day the honorary degree was bestowed.

[64] On August 5, 2005, Morgentaler received the Couchiching Award for Public Policy Leadership for his efforts on behalf of women's rights and reproductive health issues.

[67] The CLC's description reads Morgentaler, 85 and frail, accepted the award from the Officers of the Canadian Labour Congress and thanked the unions for standing with him through his many years of struggle to secure for women the right to control their own health and their own bodies.

Canadian women enjoy the right to safe and legal abortions largely because Henry Morgentaler fought a long battle on their behalf.

Morgentaler was named a Member of the Order of Canada on July 1, 2008; he was recognized "for his commitment to increased health care options for women, his determined efforts to influence Canadian public policy and his leadership in humanist and civil liberties organizations.

"[7][8] Abortion-rights activists applauded the decision, saying Morgentaler put his life and liberty on the line to advance women's rights, while anti-abortion groups strongly criticized the award, saying it debased the Order of Canada.

[72] Several members of the order said they would return their insigniae to Rideau Hall in protest, including Roman Catholic priest Lucien Larré;[73] Gilbert Finn, former Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick;[74] Frank Chauvin, a retired police detective who founded an orphanage;[75] and the Madonna House Apostolate on behalf of the late Catherine Doherty.

[76][77] Also in 2008, Canadian bishops unanimously stated that they were opposed to the appointment of the abortion provider and pro-choice advocate Henry Morgentaler to the Order of Canada, directly quoting from the Compendium of Social Doctrine.

[88] The movie is described thus: "It chronicles how the physician defiantly began his fight for women's reproductive rights in 1967, even serving time in a Quebec prison in 1975 on abortion charges.