Is Birth Control Under Attack?

Moves to Limit Contraception—From IUDs to the Pill—Are Following the Anti-Abortion Playbook

Zócalo celebrated its 20th birthday recently! As part of the festivities, we’re publishing reflections and responses that revisit and reimagine some of our most impactful stories and public programs. Social scientist Megan Kavanaugh revisits Jacqueline Coulette’s 2012 essay “How I Had Sex in 1950.” Since that time, birth control has become nearly universal in American society, but access to contraception still faces threats.

There are few things in America as universal as contraception. More than 99% of reproductive age women—and by extension, their partners—have used …

by Megan Kavanaugh | September 9, 2024

Can Two Friends Agree to Disagree on Abortion in Post-Roe America?

It’s an Issue Worth Fighting Over—But Not a Good Litmus Test at the Personal or National Level

by Joanne Samuel Goldblum and Colleen Shaddox | May 15, 2023

We met through a mutual friend who told us both, “You’ll love her. You get angry about all the same things.”

That was almost exactly correct. At the time, Joanne had …

Carmel’s Cautionary Tale for Post-Roe America

Poet Nora May French’s Account of Her 1907 Abortion Is an Infuriating Read—and a Sobering Reminder of What History Omits

by Joe Mathews | August 2, 2022

I am no longer able to think of Carmel without thinking of abortion and Nora May French.

For this new habit of mind, I blame two things: the U.S. Supreme Court, …

How My Republican Grandfather Helped Legalize Abortion

In Colorado, Mid-Century Environmentalists Were ‘Uneasy Allies’ in the Fight for Reproductive Rights

by Caroline Tracey | June 9, 2022

In winter 1967, a young Democratic state representative named Richard Lamm introduced an abortion liberalization bill in Colorado’s House of Representatives. The bill passed quickly and moved onto the Senate, …

Miscarriage Wasn’t Always a Tragedy or a Crime

How Race, Medicine, and the Law Shape Reactions to Pregnancy Loss

by Shannon Withycombe | May 18, 2022

In the fall of 2012, I woke up early in the morning with cramps. I went to the bathroom and saw blood on my underwear. I was nine weeks pregnant, …

When California Sterilized 20,000 of Its Citizens

The Golden State Was the Most Aggressive in the Country in Deeming the ‘Feebleminded’ and ‘Deviant’ Unfit to Reproduce

By Alexandra Minna Stern | January 6, 2016

Not too long ago, more than 60,000 people were sterilized in the United States based on eugenic laws. Most of these operations were performed before the 1960s in institutions for …

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