Roe v. Wade: Before and Since

Today is the 40th anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), text on Google Scholar. Various news organizations are featuring the case and the abortion debate more broadly. E.g.,

• Julie Rovner, 'Roe V. Wade' Turns 40, But Abortion Debate Is Even Older, Morning Edition, NPR, Jan. 22, 2013.
• Chris Boyette, Poll finds lack of knowledge about Roe v. Wade decision, CNN, Jan. 22, 2013
• Andrew Rosenthal, The 40th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade, N.Y. Times, Jan. 22, 2013 (editorial page editor's blog)
• 40 years after Roe v. Wade, Republican governors, lawmakers seek new limits for abortions, Wash. Post (AP), Jan. 22, 2013 
• Aaron Blake, Why Republicans should stop talking about Roe v. Wade, Wash. Post, Jan. 22, 2013 
• Rachel Wiener, Poll: On Roe v. Wade anniversary, majority think abortion should be legal, Wash. Post, Jan. 22, 2013 

A fascinating book gathers material about abortion from before 1973, so that you can see what activists, doctors, and others were saying in the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s. Linda Greenhouse & Reva Siegel, Before Roe v. Wade: Voices that Shaped the Abortion Debate Before the Supreme Court's Ruling (2010), KF9315 .B44 2010 at Classified Stacks, catalog record.

The authors make available a 406-page PDF of the book on SSRN. (This is a second edition of the book, about 70 pages longer than the paper edition.)

See the authors' law review article on the topic: Linda Greenhouse & Reva Siegel, Before (and After) Roe v. Wade: New Questions About Backlash, 120 Yale L.J. 2028 (2011), Yale L.J. site, SSRN.


A sampling of other books on Roe and related topics:

• N.E.H. Hull &  Charles Hoffer, Roe v. Wade: The Abortion Rights Controversy in American History (2001), catalog record
• David J. Garrow, Liberty and Sexuality: The Right to Privacy and the Making of Roe v. Wade (1994), catalog record
• Norma McCorvey &Andy Meisler, I am Roe: My Life, Roe v. Wade, and Freedom of Choice (1994), catalog record
• Ann Fessler, The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Fefore Roe v. Wade (2006), catalog record
• What Roe v. Wade Should Have Said: The Nation's Top Legal Experts Rewrite America's Most Controversial Decision (J. M. Balkin ed., 2005), catalog record
• Marian Faux, Roe v. Wade: The Untold Story of the Landmark Supreme Court Decision That Made Abortion Legal (2001), catalog record
• Sarah Ragle Weddington, A Question of Choice (1992), catalog record 

For more, search the catalog. These are among the helpful subject headings:

• Pro-choice movement -- United States.
• Abortion -- Social aspects -- United States.
• Women's rights -- United States.
• Women -- United States -- Social conditions -- 20th century.
• Abortion, Legal -- history -- United States.
• Family Planning Services -- history -- United States.

For a wide variety of websites, see the guide we've prepared for Beginning of Life.