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Casebook Read Credits
Gender, Sexuality, and the Law
Section 3
1 hour

Criminalizing Choices

Mary R Ziegler

The history of criminal abortion laws has long been contested. Those opposed to legal abortion argue that from the beginning, British common law has treated abortion as a serious crime, early as well as late in pregnancy. Most historians disagree, suggesting that for centuries, abortion was largely legal until quickening, the point at which movement could be detected. This debate, as we will see later in the semester, was central to the Court's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women. What everyone agrees on is that by the nineteenth century, the movement to criminalize birth control and abortion was having tremendous success. For anti-abortion leaders, the laws passed by this movement are sometimes still held up as a model. How does this history influence contemporary debates? Should it matter?

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