Talk:History of abortion law

Formatting guideline
I propose that entries made in this article follow the timeline style:


 * 40 BC - Aristole says this and that about abortion.

But I'm certainly open to suggestions... and more sections using paragraphs. If the date is uncertain ranges and/or c. (circa) can be used.


 * 375 BC–371 BC - Text description.


 * c. 500 - This is incisive and important for you to know.

Actually I guess a decision needs to be made whether this will be a history or a timeline article; or even if there is a difference between the two :-)... since the History of Bratislava is in timeline form.

- RoyBoy [ &#8734; ] 06:48, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Abortion Law
The Abortion law article has a history section that could be included here. Figuring out a timeline formation thereof might be tricky though.


 * Good call, me do some. - RoyBoy [ &#8734; ] 22:16, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Ancient History
Sorry -- the ancient history section I did wasn't following the timeline style.... I can try to fix it, but the only problem is that there aren't specific dates for most of that ancient stuff. -- Robotkultur


 * I think it's fine. The whole thing, in my opinion, doesn't have to be in timeline style.  Having the ancient section filled out is good timeline or not.  :) --Chadofborg 19:15, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I concur. I was spinning my wheels trying to find dates. If we do come across dates in books by philosophers, anthropologist, historians etc. they can be timelined below the paragraph as supplements. Well done. - RoyBoy [ &#8734; ] 16:58, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Innocent III
Can someone give a source for the passage on Innocent III?

This article has virtually no information on the History of Abortion
This article is almost exclusively concerned with the legal history of abortion, rather than the history of abortion itself. For example, when did the various modern techniques of abortion develop (EVA, intact D & X, etc.). How did people perform abortions throughout history? The article should mention Soranus, the 2nd century Greek physician. It should also mention that practitioners of herbal abortion were often accused of witchcraft in the middle ages. Everything else should be moved to a new article, History of abortion law or put in a subsection. Kaldari 23:37, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, instead of waiting around for someone to fix things, I went ahead and moved the existing article to History of abortion law and created a new article for History of abortion. This way both topics can be presented adequately. Kaldari 23:57, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Clinton 'executive order' and ru-486
I have removed a recent edit and placed it here on the talk page:
 * Bill Clinton signed an executive order mandating the legalization, promotion, and domestic manufacture of RU 486

First of all, here is the text of the memorandum. This page is about abortion law, and the timeline lists notable milestones on this topic. I am not sure if this memorandum is actually an 'executive order', but despite that, this document cannot be seen as 'law' (and doesn't the legislature, not executive branch, make laws anyway?). Next, it isn't a notable milestone either. Before removing the edit, I worked on rewording it. Here is what I had:
 * ''In a memorandum to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, President Bill Clinton, reponding to a FDA import alert (#66-47) on RU-486, "directed [the secretary to] promptly assess initiatives [to]promote the testing, licensing, and manufacturing ... of RU-486", after a proprosed reassessment of the drug by the FDA.

But after going through all that, I realized that this wasn't really notable. I think we'd need to include the 1989 ban on RU-486 and the 1993 rejection of the ban and the 1996 FDA preliminary approval and the 1998-99 congressional actions against the drug and the 2000 final approval. Then why not include the 1991 UK approval, and 1992 Swedish approval? My point is that this information isn't notable enough for this article (but I think I've been inspired to expand the mifepristone article).--Andrew c 01:18, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Feminists, abortion law, and ButNowYouKnow.com
I have removed the following text:
 * In the largely protestant U.S., through the efforts primarily of American feminists like Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony, Alice Paul, and Emma Goldman, and physicians in the American Medical Association, and legislators, most abortions in the U.S. were outlawed through state (not Federal) laws.

First of all, abortion was made illegal in most states by 1870. The last two feminists weren't even born by then (and Emma Goldman, who BTW has an abortion clinic named after her, went on to promote the decriminalization of abortion in Russia). As for the first two, there is nothing on their pages about their efforts to illegalize abortion. You are going to need more verifiable research (see comments on Talk:Abortion in regards to your webpage source) if you are going to propose changing "physicians in the American Medical Association and legislators" to "feminists" in regards to who was driving anti-abortion law.--Andrew c 01:34, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

History of abortion
Moving it to Abortion law seems counter productive. The fact recent abortion history was fought out in the courts is granted, but about half the article deals with historical religious/cultural milestones. Moving it all into another article seemed unnecessary. Merging the two would be, I think, the best option. We could delineate two articles, but that seems unnessessary, a lot of work and creates two thinner and more importantly fragmented articles, and History of "abortion law" is too specific. Merging the two creates a larger more comprehensive article, n'est pas? - RoyBoy 800 05:51, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I asked the editor who split the History of abortion page into History of abortion law to join us here. I think there is a pretty big history section already under Abortion law. Maybe this page could be merged, with some info going back to History of abortion (such as the Jane collective bit)? Or maybe we need to just have a timeline on its own page and work to expand it? Just some thoughts--Andrew c 05:38, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

The history of abortion and the history of abortion law are two separate but related topics. This article is 99% about abortion law. (Prior to modern times, religious mores = law). I would not be completely opposed to merging the two articles, although personally I think there are two different audiences: People interested in abortion as a medical procedure (doctors, medical historians, etc.) and people interested in the controversy surrounding abortion (everyone else). If we were to merge the two articles together right now, I think the information about the development of abortion as a medical procedure would still be lost in all the legal and religious stuff. The reason I moved this article in the first place is that I was interested in finding out information about the development of modern abortion procedures (D&C, MVA, etc.). I read through this whole article and was amazed that there wasn't any substantial content about abortion itself, only information about abortion as a moral and religious controversy. It would be like the article on Marijuana only talking about drug laws and never mentioning that it's a plant. Apparently moving the article worked, as there is now a nicely developing article on the history of abortion itself. I would like to see that article develop a little more before we seriously consider remerging. I would also like to see this article changed from a timeline list to an actual encyclopedia article. As it stands now this article is somewhat tedious and not very readable. If we do eventually merge, we should make sure that the information about abortion as a legal and moral controversy does not overwhelm the information about abortion itself, as the history of abortion as a medical procedure is an interesting topic in its own right. I think a good example to go on is History of intersex surgery. The article is primarily about the procedure itself and how it has developed over the years, but it also includes a section on controversies surrounding the procedure. If we have a merged article on the history of abortion it should be the same way IMO, although obviously with abortion there is going to be a bit more overlap. Kaldari 01:19, 19 March 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree with most of that; History of abortion law could be put in a subsection with its structure essentially intact. But as you said the History of abortion is developing; it would be prudent to let things be for a while and see how much it grows. - RoyBoy 800 03:39, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, back from a vacation. Essentially, I have three ideas for logical breaks in the coverage of abortion history. They are medical, legal, and moral, and would be presented as follows:

1. History of abortion: Covering the history of induced abortion, that is, explanations — including unsuccessful folk remedies like "jumping up and down" — of how it was performed in ancient times, the development of specific procedures and technology, references to abortion procedures in classical literature, etc., etc. This section should also deal with historical access to abortion procedures, and, thus, information on Victorian abortifacient advertisements and the Jane Collective would go here.

2. History of abortion law: Covering the history of abortion legislation. Should clerical opinion be held as equivalent to laws enacted by governments — or should such be covered in the section I am about to propose?

3. Historical perspectives of abortion: Covering the history of the abortion debate. The information on the opinions of some early suffragists would be moved here from History of abortion, where it could be expanded, to included actual quotations from Susan B. Anthony, etc.

Is this proposal logical and feasible? If so, should it be broken into three seperate articles, or rather merged into one collective one, History of abortion, with three major sub-sections? -Kyd 22:58, 19 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Looks like an excellent proposal; I would prefer sub-sections in one article. It would really be the last major step to creating a robust, detailed and broad article of abortion history. Me feeling excited. :"D RoyBoy 800 17:26, 20 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Glad to know. I suppose we should begin working on merging History of Abortion Law into History of Abortion. -Kyd 05:38, 23 March 2006 (UTC)