Women Have the Right to Choose Abortion An abortion is a woman's option to terminate a pregnancy. It is an induced miscarriage. Abortion has become an extremely controversial topic in the past 3 decades since it has been legalized. There has been extreme violence stemming from this issue that we as a country need to put under control, regardless of our personal stances on the issue. There are many reasons why a woman would choose to have an abortion. She does not feel she is ready to be a parent, she can not afford a baby, and being too young or immature to be responsible for another life are only three of these reasons. If a woman becomes pregnant due to a rape or from incest would be another reason. It has been found that almost fifty per cent of all women will have an abortion by the time they reach 45. Is this number increasing since the legalization of abortion? Probably not, considering the fact that before abortions were legal they were still being preformed. The only difference is now they are safer. Before 1965, abortion was somewhat taboo. No one dared to even discuss the issue. Abortion was frowned upon and considered "evil"; therefore it remained a very private issue. Abortions were performed by doctors, nurses, midwives, even chiropractors. Being that abortions were not performed in a hospital or clinic, anyone who felt like it could become an abortionist. These abortions were referred to as back- alley abortions. They were unsafe and lead to the deaths of many women, but in 1933 it was estimated that nearly 2 million were performed (Grisey). This proves to us that regardless if abortion is legal or not, if a woman feels she needs to have one she is going to. The prices of thes... ... middle of paper ... ... to an increase in child abuse and neglect. I am not encouraging the use of abortion as a method of birth control, but accidents will happen. Some people are responsible enough to deal with these accidents, but some feel that they are not ready to bring a child into this world. If a mother feels she can not properly care for a child, isn't it better for the fetus to be aborted before it is brought into a world where it can not be properly loved, cared for and supported? Bibliography: Works Cited 1. Grady, John L, Abortion Yes or No. (no printing press). Florida,1972. 2. Grisey, Germain, Abortion: the Myths, the Realities and the Argument.Corpus Books, New York,1970. 3. O'Donnell, Thomas J, Medicine and Christian Morality. Alba House, New York, 1976 4. www.plannedparenthood.org/abortion.html 5. www.religioustolerance.org/abortion.htm
It was unethical and caused many medical problems. One of the first states to prohibit the practice of abortion was Connecticut in 1821. They wanted many places who performed these practices to restrict using toxic material to cause abortions. After this law passed, many states followed in suit. The next ruling to pass was the Comstock law in 1873. This law banned materials that were relative to abortion and contraception from being passed out to women. During the Great Depression in the 1930s, the rate of illegal abortions have increased. Many women did not want to have the burden of having a child during economic stress within the country. Due to many doctors practicing dangerous abortions, the number of death tolls were high. By the 1940s, the death toll had declined. During the 1950s, hospitals within the country started to decide if doctors should perform abortion by using therapeutic abortion boards, allowed by law only if the mother’s life was in any danger. Mortality rates decreased during this time, due to the introduction of antibiotics in the
Although abortions were very dangerous, as well as socially unacceptable during the nineteenth century, women were not altogether unable to obtain abortions and many suffered accusations of infanticide. Here I will present a few of the more famous cases from the period, demonstrating the occurrence of abortion, the availability of providers, and the consequences faced by those who necessitated the procedure.
In 1900 a law was passed banning women from having an abortion. Before 1900, abortions were a common practice and usually performed by a midwife, but doctors saw this as a financial threat and pushed for a law making abortions illegal. From 1900 until 1973, when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of a women’s right to have an abortion, women who wanted to have an abortion did so secretly. These secret abortions were performed
Hiding behind the idea of “restoring” one’s menses, abortion was practiced throughout colonial America. However, abortions weren’t fully considered to be so until after the quickening in pregnancy. Quickening was marked by when the baby would kick, so in a time when not that much was known about the female body quickening was the only thing that confirmed if a woman was pregnant or not. The opinion on abortifacients changed over time and was dependent on who was taking advantage of them. People seemed to be more concerned about the fact that abortions were used to cover up the sin of fornication in the 18th century, whereas in the 19th century the more pressing issue was the fact that married upper- and middle-class women were now using abortifacients just to avoid childbirth.
During the mid-19th Century there were no actual federal law regulating abortions, many states were against it and banned the whole practice entirely, except when the life of the mother was in danger. However there were some states that made no exception, not even to save the mother’s life. A lot of women argued that it was unconstitutional, and found other ways to have one. Whether it was by an unlicensed physician or performed the procedure themselves. Most illegal abortions were dangerous because they were performed in unsanitary conditions. As a result, many states such as the United States and New York began to legitimize or ban abortions complete...
Although the history of how abortion became such a taboo act, forcing many women to attempt to self-induce, may be unclear, one thing is evident: the criminalization of abortions has greatly harmed women in America. The change from common law, which allowed abortions prior to quickening, to codified laws that prohibited it, was the beginning of the criminalization of abortion. In addition, the actions of the American Medical Association to get rid of non-traditional practitioners, and the way the Church changed its perspectives on abortion played a crucial role in making it harder for women to obtain abortions. Due to these actions, the danger of abortions increased because the only ones that were accessible were often underground, and unsafe. If it were not these occurrences many women would have been more likely to survive abortions.
Until the mid 1800s, abortion was unrestricted and unregulated in the United States. The justifications for criminalizing it varied from state to state. One big reason was population control, which addressed fears that the population would be dominated by the children of newly ...
With all the hot debate going on in modern days, it would almost seem that talk about abortion has found its way into society’s controversies for millennia, but it wasn’t criminalized until the late 1880s, a time when the medical profession desired to gain more status and power (“Abortion”). Certainly being some of the more educated people at that time, especially educated men, they achieved that goal, creating a huge stigma surrounding abortion. It became illegal for
due to the lady having been raped, or sometimes a lady can't [¶17e] support a baby.
The practice of abortion, which is the terminating of a pregnancy to avoid giving birth, has been in use for thousands of years, even dating back to the ancient times and when the early settlers had first arrived to the Americas. Due to lack of technology, some pregnancies were often terminated by use of herbs, sharpened tools, and even applying pressure to the abdomen, the NAF (National Abortion Federation) reported. As time went on and at the beginning of the 1800s, states began passing laws that made abortion illegal to keep immigrant numbers down. However, during this time, abortion was a very risky procedure. There were not many hospitals, antiseptics were inexistent, and many of the doctors were still in their early years of medical education. In the early 20th century in midst the inner cities, women would seek back alley abortions. Why would women seek out this dangerous procedure? Abortion was illegal at the time, so back alley abortions were the only way to go for women who were desperate enough t...
All surgical procedures including abortion were very risky in the 1800’s. The dangers from abortion were similar to the dangers from surgeries that were not out lawed. In the 1800’s the large amounts of women who needed abortions had no choice but to get them from illegal practitioners. Even when it was illegal abortion was practiced. For a women to get an abortion, safe or not it depended on her economic situation. In the 1960’s the people who performed the abortion turned away women if they could not pay $1,000 or more. Some of the male abortionist before performing th...
According to a chart in book 2, 76%of women get abortions because of life-style concerns. Other reasons are ?Can?t afford baby now?, ?Problems in relationship?, ?Unready for responsibility?, ?Embarrassed about sex?, ?Not mature enough?, ?Enough children all ready?, ?Partner wants it?, ?Health of fetus?, ?Health of woman?, ?Parents want it?, and ?Rape or incest?. These are reason that women get an abortion or abortions.
Abortion was legally being done since 1880 in the United States. During that time, many states have started to ban abortion. Even though abortion was illegal in many places, it was still being practiced. Many by licensed physicians. They “risked losing their license to perform the abortions”. Even though abortion was illegal in most states, women all over the United States were getting abortion illegally. Some even performed self-abortions with “hanger and needles”. “Also many women would go to other countries and get an abortion”. Many felt the banning abortions was a way to limit women’s rights which led to many court cases. (ourbodiesourselves.org)
With so many women choosing to have abortions, it would be expected that it would not be so greatly frowned up, yet society is still having problems with its acceptance. Every woman has the fundamental right to decide for herself, free from government interference, whether or not to have an abortion. Today, more than ever, American families do not want the government to trample on their right to privacy by mandating how they must decide on the most intimate, personal matters. That is why, even though Americans may differ on what circumstances for terminating a crisis pregnancy are consistent with their own personal moral views, on the fundamental question of who should make this personal decision, the majority of Americans agree that each woman must have the right to make this private choice for herself. Anti-choice proposals to ban abortions for “sex-selection” or “birth-control” are smokescreens designed to shift the focus of the debate away from this issue and trivialize the seriousness with which millions of women make this highly personal decision. Any government restriction on the reasons for which women may obtain legal abortions violates the core of this right and could force all women to publicly justify their reasons for seeking abortion.
Death cases related to abortion at the time were also on the rise. Women performed these procedures traditionally without any medical background.