Event

Abortion in American History: Intimate Decisions, Medical Knowledge, and Legal Decrees in the Two Centuries Before Roe v. Wade

This conference brings together leading scholars to explore the multifaceted history of abortion in 19th- and 20th-century America. Building on the Longo Collection in Reproductive Biology, this conference will explore the underlying history that can deepen public understanding of the controversial politics of abortion law.
Conferences

New academic research on abortion history has surged in recent years, spurred by the lead-up to the Dobbs decision in 2022. Dobbs arrived at a time when a solid court majority professed reliance on originalism, a form of legal analysis that uses constitutional history and its presumed original meaning as the basis for court decisions. Historians have been busy presenting amicus briefs, both in Dobbs and in a continuing flurry of state court cases since the ruling returned abortion law to the states. Accurately understanding both legal and reproductive history has never been more important.

Key Details

  • Conference registration is good for both days and includes general admission to The Huntington.
  • Lunch reservations close on Jan. 13 at noon.
  • A limited number of lunch tickets will be available for purchase day of at the conference.

Day of Program

  • Please bring registration confirmation with you.

Conference Schedule

Fri., Jan. 17

8:30 a.m. | Registration and Coffee

9 a.m. | Welcome

  • Susan Juster (The Huntington), Patricia Cline Cohen (UC Santa Barbara)

9:15 a.m. | Session 1

  • Moderator: Lauren MacIvor Thompson (Kennesaw State University)

  • Brooke Lansing Mai (Johns Hopkins University)
    "Speaking About Abortion: The Language of Pregnancy Termination in Antebellum New York" (provisional)

  • Nicholas L. Syrett (University of Kansas)
    “Madame Restell and the Reproductive Services Market in Antebellum New York”

10:45 a.m. | Break

11 a.m. | Session 2

  • Moderator: Kate Masur (Northwestern University)
  • Aaron Tang (UC Davis)
    “How Many States Actually Banned Pre-Quickening Abortion in 1868? An Investigation Into the 'most important historical fact' in Dobbs”

  • Patricia Cline Cohen (UC Santa Barbara)
    “Dr. Horatio Storer and the Deceptive Statistics that Instigated the 1860s National Campaign to Criminalize Abortion”

12:30 p.m. | Lunch

2 p.m. | Session 3

  • Moderator: Aaron Tang (UC Davis)

  • Kate Masur (Northwestern University)
    “The Fourteenth Amendment and Abortion: Some Problems with Originalist Approaches”

  • Lauren MacIvor Thompson (Kennesaw State University)
    “The Comstock Law’s “Lost” Medical Exemption”

Sat., Jan. 18

9 a.m. | Session 4

  • Moderator: Lina-Maria Murillo (University of Iowa)

  • Shannon K. Withycombe (University of New Mexico)
    “Human Creatures and Dying Women: Medical and Popular Depictions of Abortion and Fetal Life in the West, 1857-1900”

  • Jacqueline Antonovich (Muhlenberg College)
    “Women Physicians and the Politics and Practice of Abortion Care in the American West”

10:30 a.m. | Break

10:45 a.m. | Session 5

  • Moderator: Jacqueline Antonovich (Muhlenberg College)

  • Alicia Gutierrez-Romine (California State University San Bernardino)
    “Therapeutic Abortion Exceptions: Shifting Interpretations in 1950s and 1960s California”

  • Lina-Maria Murillo (University of Iowa)
    “The Army of Three and the Untold History of America’s Abortion Underground”

12:15 p.m. | Lunch

1:30 p.m. | Roundtable: How does History Inform the Present? Perspectives from Law and History

  • Mary Ziegler (UC Davis)
  • Nancy F. Cott (Harvard University)

For questions about this event, please contact researchconference@huntington.org or 626-405-3432.

Side-by-side photos of a small wooden box holding an ivory figure of a woman (left) and "open" with anatomical body parts both inside and next to the body (right).

Ivory anatomical mannequin of a pregnant woman (Europe?: 17th or 18th century?), carved ivory, wood box, 22 x 9cm. RB 653419. | Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens.