Opposition to reproductive rights in this country extends much further back in time than the fight to legalize abortion. In the nineteenth century legislation criminalized abortion and doctors saw pregnancy as a disease. In the 1970s, a backlash movement swiftly followed the U.S. Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion, setting the tone of the conflict ever since.
To the women's movement, access to abortion represents women's ability to control their own lives. But in defense of a natural, Biblically mandated order, the Christian Right has always been interested in a much broader agenda than just banning abortion. Its comprehensive "family values" approach also targets access to emergency contraception, the vaccine for the human papilloma virus, comprehensive sexuality education, single parenting, and what they call "anchor babies," the children of undocumented immigrants who receive citizen status because they were born in the United States.
By contrast, the goal of the today's reproductive justice movement is the total health and well-being of all women and their children, acknowledging not only the diversity of women living in the United States today but the connectedness of their social, political, and health care needs.
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Senior Researcher Pam Chamberlain presented this workshop at the New Leadership Networking Initiative national meeting in March 2007. It argues that Reproductive Justice cannot be attained without understanding the opposition.
