Historical Context
This page provides historical context for contraception, birth control, abortion, and other women's reproductive rights topics.
General histories
Abortion in America by ISBN: 0195022491Publication Date: 1978Chronicles the incidence of abortion in nineteenthand twentieth-century America and the causes and processes of the profound social change which resulted, by 1900, in the nearly universal legal proscription of abortion.
Contraception and control
- Video oral history with Dorothy Roberts byPublication Date: 2016
Abortion: The Jane Collective
- Jane Abortion Collective oral history collectionAvailable at Special Collections and University Archives, University of Illinois at Chicago
- The JanesDocumentary from 2022 available on HBO and Hulu
- Before Roe, the women of 'Jane' provided abortions for the women of Chicago.Aired on All Things Considered, NPR, June 10, 2022
- Jane: Abortion Before RoeEpisode of the podcast "Can We Talk?," Jewish Women's Archive, December 21, 2021
Abortion: The Clergy Consultation Service
Abortion Counseling and Social Change from Illegal ACT to Medical Practice by ISBN: 9780817005795Publication Date: 1973
- Papers of the Clergy Consultation ServiceAvailable at Deering Library of Special Collections, Northwestern University
- Chicago Clergy Consultation Service recordsAvailable at Special Collections and University Archives, University of Illinois at Chicago
- The ProcedureEpisode of the podcast "Criminal," July 7, 2017
Abortion: Medical education and practice
Chicago-area archival collections
- Abortion Rights Association of Illinois recordsAvailable at Special Collections and University Archives, University of Illinois at Chicago
- Chicago Abortion Fund recordsAvailable at Special Collections and University Archives, University of Illinois at Chicago
- Planned Parenthood Association Chicago Area recordsAvailable at the Chicago History Museum
- Jenny Knauss Collection and Jenny Knauss PapersKnauss worked with women's health organizations in Chicago. Available at Deering Library of Special Collections, Northwestern University
- Paula Kamen CollectionKamen interviewed people who worked with the Jane Collective. Available at Deering Library of Special Collections, Northwestern University
Supreme Court decisions
- Timeline of Important Reproductive Freedom Cases Decided by the Supreme CourtCompiled by the ACLU
- United States v. One Package of Japanese Pessaries (1936)Comstock Act [see below] cannot bar shipment of contraceptives made by the order of a licensed medical doctor
- Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)Right to privacy protects married couples' right to use contraceptives
- Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972)Protects right of unmarried people to possess contraceptives
- Roe v. Wade (1973)Right to privacy protects right to abortion
- Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey (1992)Right to abortion upheld but states can ban to protect life of a viable fetus
- Gonzales v. Carhart (2007)States can pass laws against partial-birth abortion based on special ethical and moral concerns
- Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization (2022)Constitution does not confer the right to abortion
Federal law
- Comstock lawsFirst passed in 1873, lumped in contraceptives, abortifacients, etc., with a ban of distribution of "obscene" materials through the postal service
- Hyde Amendment (1977)Barred use of federal funds to pay for abortions