Abortion

Since 1973, women have had the legal right to decide whether or not to have an abortion  yet, even today, numerous barriers threaten women’s ability to exercise this central right.. We’re working to ensure that women have access to abortion care by protecting and advancing this fundamental right.

Highlights

Fact Sheet | 2013 State Level Abortion Restrictions at Mid-Year: An Extreme Overreach into Women’s Reproductive Health Care

September 17, 2013

This year marks the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court ruling that affirmed a woman’s right to a safe and legal abortion. Yet, anti-abortion state politicians continue to relentlessly attack this right, in the hopes of overturning Roe and preventing women from obtaining abortions. In the first 6 months of 2013, state lawmakers enacted 43 restrictions on abortion, including outright bans.   This is the second highest number of enacted restrictions at the mid-year mark, and equal to the total number of restrictions enacted in 2012.  These state restrictions are a dangerous overreach into women’s personal medical decisions.

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Fact Sheet | Requiring Crisis Pregnancy Centers to Disclose Limits on Care Is Part of a Long Tradition of Protecting Women’s Decision-making and Access to Reproductive Health Care

April 9, 2013

Women face many obstacles to receiving comprehensive, affordable, quality health care, including when individuals and institutions refuse to provide health care services.   Some even go so far as to refuse to inform women about their health care options or even to notify women that there are certain services or information that they will not provide.  This prevents women from participating fully in their own medical decision-making.  Not only are their rights compromised, their health may be harmed.

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Fact Sheet | Roe v. Wade and the Right to Abortion

January 18, 2013

The long-standing, well-established constitutional right to privacy places limits on the government’s ability to interfere with a person’s most basic, personal decisions – including the decision whether and when to bear children.  The right to abortion was first recognized four decades ago, and the Supreme Court has repeatedly reaffirmed its central holding, yet this fundamental constitutional right is under ever-increasing attack.

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Fact Sheet | Even More Than Abortion: The Constitutional Importance of Roe v. Wade and the Right to Privacy

January 18, 2013

Roe did far more than establish the right to abortion; it solidified and expanded the constitutional “right to privacy,” which has also been described as the right to autonomy or to be let alone.  This right to privacy is part of the right to liberty protected by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, which state that no person shall be deprived of “life, liberty or property, without due process of law.”

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More Resources

Reports & Toolkits | Application of Research Findings on Issues Surrounding Reproductive Health and Abortion

January 11, 2008

On behalf of NWLC and Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Peter D. Hart Research Associates, Inc., undertook a comprehensive research project lasting throughout most of 2007 focused on issues surrounding reproductive health and abortion. The quantitative portion of this research, the findings of which are reported here, comprised a large-scale national survey of 1,870 registered voters with oversamples of African-American and Hispanic voters.

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Fact Sheet | In the 2006-2007 Term, the Newly Reconstituted Court Undermines Civil Rights and Thwarts Justice for Women

June 28, 2007

A number of crucial decisions from the Supreme Court's 2006-2007 term starkly illustrate the disastrous consequences of the new composition of the Court for the future of women's rights.

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Fact Sheet | Gonzales v. Carhart: The Supreme Court Turns Its Back on Women's Health and on Three Decades of Constitutional Law

May 15, 2007
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Legal Briefs & Testimony | Amicus Brief: Alberto R. Gonzales, Attorney General v. Leroy Carhart

September 20, 2006
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Reports & Toolkits | Hospital Mergers and the Threat to Women's Reproductive Health Services: Using the Establishment Clause of the Constitution to Fight Back

June 09, 2006

This report explains how constitutional provisions requiring the separation of church and state may be used in efforts to protect access to reproductive health services.

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