Until the Supreme Court verdict of Roe v. Wade in 1973, abortion was illegal in the United States. However, the law did not stop black market procedures. Although impossible to report exact numbers, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) estimated in 2014, that 1.2 million U.S. women had an illegal abortion each year, causing as many as 5,000 annual maternal deaths (Davis 117). In the book, The American Woman’s Movement, Margaret Cerullo’s “Hidden History: An Illegal Abortion” illustrates the dangerous reality of these unregulated back-alley abortions (Cerullo 1). Women were transported to unknown locations and had procedures performed on them by strangers who may or may not have had a medical degree. Cerullo met a “man carrying groceries, [and] went off with him to his car.” She then encountered a strange man wearing a mask who performed the sterilization. After the procedure, she realized that she was “a woman, not a ‘human being.’” At that moment, she understood that she lacked reproductive freedom and therefore a basic human right.

Reproductive rights became one of the major issues of the Second Wave Feminist Movement. The ability to have agency over one’s body was cited as one of the most important steps in gaining freedom for women. Feminists lobbied for laws that granted access to safe and legal abortions. They published literature to raise awareness and create community. They worked with hospitals and doctors to help develop comprehensive female health policies and practices. Groups formed and people protested.

Feminists did not only rally for health rights. At the same time, they explored the extremely heavy burden on the individual woman that comes with abortion and the complexity of the decision. In particular, women began to share their personal experiences through the medium of poetry. In Lucille Clifton’s “the lost baby poem,” published in 1971 in Vol. 12 Issue 1. of the Massachusetts Review, the speaker reflects on her decision to have an abortion years after the event (Clifton 9). The Massachusetts Review is an independent quarterly journal of literature, the arts, and public affairs which focuses on creating political conversations (Editorial 2). Thus, Clifton’s poem was chosen to be a part of the abortion debate. From the beginning, the poem contains a sorrowful tone. The speaker refers to her aborted fetus as “you,” granting it identity and life (Clifton 9). The speaker feels connected to the fetus and is saddened by her loss as she reflects “what did i know about waters rushing back/ what did i know about drowning/ or being drowned” (Clifton 9). The “waters rushing back” refers to both the physical consequences of her period cycle returning and the mental consequences that accompany the abortion. Continuing the water metaphor, the verb “drowning” indicates emotional turmoil and distress. The speaker feels sorrow and shame. However, there is a shift in the next stanza. Clifton reflects that the potential child “would have been born into winter/ in the year of the/ disconnected gas/ and no car” (Clifton 10). The mother reflects on her personal financial struggle. She does not have enough money to raise another child. She contemplates that to ensure the survival of her existing children, she would have to give the child up for adoption and “watch you slip like ice into strangers’ hands” (Clifton 10). Furthermore, the mother finds it improbable that the child would have found a loving home as it would have “fallen [like] snow in winter.” In the last stanza, the speaker upholds her decision for the sake of her existing children. She swears “if i am ever less than a mountain / for your definite brothers and sisters / let the River pour over my head” (Clifton 10). Although the speaker may be saddened by the loss of potential life, she does not regret her actions. She utilizes her sorrow as fuel to be strong for her existing children, the potential child’s “definite brothers and sisters.”

Works Cited:

Cerullo, Margaret. “Hidden History: An Illegal Abortion.”  The American Women’s Movement,1945-200, 2009, pp 1-43

Clifton, Lucille. “The Lost Baby Poem.” The Massachusetts Review 12, no. 1, 1971, pp. 108–9

“Editorial.” The Massachusetts Review 12, no. 1, 1971, pp. 2

 

 

Women of color were disproportionately victimized by a lack of reproductive rights. In New York, around 80 percent of the deaths caused by illegal abortions were Black or Puerto Rican women (Davis 117). The negative conditions were furthered by the general lack of accessibility women of color had to these health procedures. Published in 1970, Vol. 1 Issue 11 of Everywoman dives into the differences in perception between white feminists and feminists of color. The simple, black and white, news and current affairs magazine aimed for an audience of “real women” including women of every race, feminists and non-feminists alike. The issue contains an article about a conference with two contrasting views about the same conference, one written by the Black author Caroline Laud and the other by a white, anonymous author. Laud chose to write her section in the form of a short dramatic sketch called “Conference in Black.” The piece is formatted as a call and response between white, “Liberal Women” and Black Women (Laud 5). In the sketch, the liberal women state, “tummy too round” and the Black women reply “Goddamn baby inside…/ Can’t afford to keep it… Can’t afford to get an abortion” (Laud 5). In the performance of the sketch, those playing the liberal women hold mirrors to their faces connoting vanity. The line “tummy too round” makes the white women seem absorbed only with their looks. They are worried about becoming too fat while Black women struggle with an unplanned pregnancy that they “can’t afford.” Laud claims that women of color have even less agency over their reproductive health than their vain, white counterparts.

Considering that the issue of reproductive rights especially impacted women of color, one would expect that women of all identities would unite under the cause. But in actuality, the issue was extremely divisive. Most of the women who supported abortion rights were white, middle-class, liberal woman. On the other hand, as Angela Davis observes in the chapter “Racism, Birth Control, and Reproductive Rights” of the book Woman Race Class published in 1981, the “ranks of the abortion rights campaign did not include substantial numbers of women of color” (Davis117). Furthermore, white women did not seem to understand or acknowledge this divide. The contrasting sides to the Everywoman article “Conference in Black / and White” highlights this discrepancy. Where Laud chooses to write about the inequity within the movement, the anonymous white author frames the conference with a much more positive tone (Conference 5). She reflects that at the conference, “we shared our thoughts, our feelings, our conflicts, our love. Sisters who had never met felt a sense of community with each other.” The stark contrast between these two works reflects the obliviousness of many white liberal feminists to the struggles of women of color.

Many women of color did not support the abortion rights campaign because white liberal feminists failed to understand the significance of including sterilizations within the policies. Within the U.S. history of birth control lies a history of eugenics. In 1905 President Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed that “race purity must be maintained” and the falling rates of white births were “race suicide” (Davis 121). Later the Eugenics Society was formed and soon after claimed: “twenty-six states had passed compulsory sterilization laws [and] thousands of ‘unfit’ persons had already been surgically prevented from reproducing” (Davis 121). The American Birth Control League also formed and supported birth control specifically among Black people. Its successor, the Birth Control Federation of America, planned a “Negro Project” in 1939. The project claimed that the black population in the South “breed carelessly and disastrously, with the result that the increase among Negroes, even more than among whites, is from that portion of the population least fit, and least able to rear children properly” (Davis 123). Furthermore, so-called “population control” was also deeply rooted in the very beginning of the birth control movement. Margaret Sanger, a champion of birth control, advocated for its usage to reduce births by women of color. Sanger wrote in a letter to a colleague, “We do not want word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population” (Davis 125).

These practices continued into the 1970s. At the beginning of the abortion movement, many assumed that population control through abortions and permanent contraceptives such as sterilization would be the solution to poverty. Reduced family sizes would mean fewer people to support and feed. The U.S. government supported such population control efforts, creating sterilization projects within the ​​Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. According to the news section of Vol. 5, Issue 6 of Women’s Press, in the eight years before the issue was published in 1975, “the U.S. government has increased its population control budget by 6,000%” (Houghma 4). These projects often targeted women of color and had a much larger impact than was advertised at the time. In 1972 the department claimed that around 16,000 women and 8,000 men had been sterilized (Davis 120). But today, Carl Shultz, director of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare’s Population Affairs Office, estimates that between 100,000 and 200,000 sterilizations had actually been funded that year by the federal government.

In response, people of color began to write about the horrors of the government’s push for “population control.” Chicana/o poets in particular explored the terrible effects of mass sterilizations on their communities. For instance, the anthology From the belly of the shark contains several poems by Chicana/o poets which express individual experiences with the issue. Published in 1970, the anthology includes works by Chicanos, Inuits, Hawaiians, Indians, and Puerto Ricans in the United States. In particular, the poem “Creciendo en el barrio” by Chicana poet Donna James, explores how the horrors of this practice impacts the entire community through its children (James 104). “Creciendo en el barrio” translates to growing up in the barrio, a lower-income Spanish-speaking area of a town or city. In the fourth stanza, James exposes the reality of the so-called “population control” initiatives in these communities.

 

And in the clinics ninos die

 Before and after birth

“Far too many Mexicans in this town”

“Don’t they breed like rabbits though”

The children are dying in the clinics “before and after birth.” In the hospitals, women are forced to get sterilizations and, if they do have a child, the community is so harmful that some children do not survive. James demonstrates that neither their nation’s government nor their hospitals value the lives of those within the barrio. Through the use of quotations, James attempts to capture the rationale of these institutions. To outsiders, the people in the barrio are considered “Mexicans” even though they reside in America. By not referring to these people as “Mexican-American,” they are categorized as other. The visitors continue to state, “don’t they breed like rabbits though,” reducing the people of the community to rabbits, an animal considered small prey that reproduces extremely rapidly. The government systems are taking advantage of this community through a mindset of dehumanization.

Thus, as Davis claims in the book Woman Race Class, although many of these women were “in favor of abortion rights [it] did not mean they were proponents of abortion” (Davis 118). Women of color understood the horrors that accompanied a lack of reproductive rights, yet they also had experienced the permanent, non-consensual effects of mass sterilizations. Morally, many could not support the abortion movement if they were not guaranteed protection.

Works Cited:

“Conference in Black and White.” pp. 4. Everywoman, vol. 1, no. 11. Dec. 1970, pp. 5

Davis, Angela. “Racism, Birth Control, and Reproductive Rights.” Woman Race Class, Vintage E-Books, 1981, pp. 117-127

Houghma, Ishi. “News.” Women’s Press 5, no. 6  September 1, 1975 pp.4

James, Donna. “Creciendo en el barrio.” From the Belly of the Shark : A New Anthology of Native Americans : Poems by Chicanos, Eskimos, Hawaiians, Indians, Puerto Ricans inthe U.S.A., with Related Poems by Others. 1st Vintage Books ed. New York. 1973.pp. 102-104

Laud, Caroline. “Conference in Black and White.” pp. 4. Everywoman, vol. 1, no. 11. Dec. 1970, pp. 4

The belief that population control could combat poverty was not only held by policymakers in the U.S. government. On a smaller scale, hospitals and individual doctors supported the movement as well. In the front page article of Triple Jeopardy / Racism Imperialism Sexism Vol. 3 Issue 3, “Sterilization: La Operacion/ The doctor may need it more than you!,” the author Gloria Rivera exposes the medical practice surrounding sterilization at the time(Rivera 1). Published in 1974, Triple Jeopardy  / Racism Imperialism Sexism was produced by the Third World Women’s Alliance. Racism is listed as the first of the three issues that make up the “Triple” of the title, indicating that the periodical was written primarily for an audience of women of color. This article was also written in Spanish, increasing accessibility to Latin American women whose primary language is not English. It includes a combination of both jarring second-hand quotes from medical professionals at the time and advice for women of color to avoid unwanted sterilization procedures. The article begins by exposing the “for the greater good” mentality which medical professionals used to rationalize their actions. A Gynecologist named Dr. Wood is quoted claiming that, “People pollute, and too many people crowded too close together cause many of our social and economic problems… As physicians we have obligations to our individual patients, but we also have obligations to the society of which we are a part” (Rivera 1).

In addition to “population control,” there were monetary incentives to perform sterilizations. The more procedures a hospital performed, the more government funds it received. In the article “Sterilization: La Operacion/ The doctor may need it more than you!,” Rivera claims that hospitals paid their doctors more based on how many “tubes they had tied” (Rivera 1). They categorized sterilizations as one of the few procedures their young physicians could perform, reminding physicians that, “everyone that you get to get her tubes tied means two tubes (i.e. an operation) for a resident or intern” (Rivera 1). They also pushed their young physicians to perform as many operations as possible. In the article, the overseeing physician is quoted as saying, “‘I want to congratulate the resident staff for 11 postpartum (after birth) tubal ligations last week.’ Another doctor responded, ‘They did even better last week. They did 15”’(Rivera 1).

Incentivized by warped beliefs about poverty, money, and additional experience, medical professionals responded by developing systems to increase the number of sterilizations of minority women. These strategies often lead to procedures being performed without the patient’s consent. One common way doctors would trick their patients into receiving an abortion was by taking advantage of different levels of literacy.  The Vol. 5 Issue 6 of the midwest periodical The Amazon exposes this method. Published in 1977, in the article “Women’s Union/ Sterilization Abuse” by Fai DeMark, white folk artist Kristen Lems’ poem reflects upon the speaker’s experience with a “neighbor who’d been sterilized” (DeMark 2).

When I learned of my neighbor who’d been sterilized

 I wasn’t surprised.

She had not been warned when she signed those white forms,

 but I wasn’t surprised.

Lems repeats the phrase “wasn’t surprised” to indicate the prevalence and historical nature of the issue. Mass sterilizations have happened in the past and continue to disproportionately affect those who “had not been warned.” Often women of color did not know what they were agreeing to because they could not read the complicated medical jargon of “those white forms” (DeMark 2). Therefore, many women did not understand the procedure that was being performed. An example of the horrifying effects of this misinformation can be seen in Vol. 3 Issue 3 of Big Mama Rag, a Western Woman’s Journal. Published in 1975, the article “Indian Woman Sterilizations Seen as Genocide” looks into the impact of sterilizations on the population of an unnamed Native American Reservation in Oklahoma. The article finds that on this reservation, “one in four women did not realize the procedure [of sterilization] was irreversible and would have preferred to use a different form of contraception” (Hille 3).

Doctors also blackmailed women into getting sterilizations by withholding other forms of care if they did not agree to the procedure. Abortion, miscarriage, and even delivery were on the table. In the anthology From the Belly of the Shark, David Hernandez explores the horror of the reality of sterilizations being performed after an unrelated procedure in his forward “Puerto Ricans in the U.S.A.” In the forward, Hernandez chooses to write a poem, gifting the reader “el corazon y alma/heart and soul of my people. Our poetry,” (Hernandez 197).  He begins each stanza with a “dream” which he then counters with the reality of “Chicago.” In one of the passages Hernandez first states the dream of “[settling] in a neighborhood with/ good stores, good schools,/ good hospitals and big tall churches” (Hernandez 197). The Puerto Rican-Americans are hoping for a community with a flourishing economy made up of “good stores”. They are looking for “big tall churches” that indicate hope and faith in the future. They are hoping for access to education through “good schools” and healthcare through “good hospitals.”  Instead Chicago grants them a different reality. A reality that includes falling for a girl and “singing “i just met a girl named/ Maria” (Hernandez 197). Yet, then discovering that “maria’s in the hospital getting her/ tubes tied/ after a miscarriage.” The name Maria is at first capitalized, indicating that she has power and humanity. This is lost after she is forced to give up a part of herself through getting “her tubes tied.” She has lost a child through a “miscarriage” and then loses the chance to have any more. Maria went into the hospital for a “miscarriage” and receives a sterilization, a completely unrelated procedure. The dream was for a “good hospital” but instead the healthcare system takes advantage of her. Now, the community is not able to create the next generation, diminishing hope for the future. For the Chicana women in this community, the dream of a positive healthcare system is always out of reach. This poem reflects a growing movement of published literature by people of color about the horrors surrounding mass sterilization. Through various articles, poems, images, and letters, such authors began to raise awareness and helped articulate the centrality of a woman’s consent in reproductive decisions.

 

Works Cited:

DeMark, Fai. “Women’s Union/ Sterilization Abuse.” The Amazon 5, no. 6 p. 2

Hille, Carol. “Indian Woman Sterilizations Seen as Genocide.” Big Mama Rag 3, no. 3, April 1,1975, pp. 3

Hernandez, David . “Puerto Ricans in the U.S.A” From the Belly of the Shark : A New Anthology of Native Americans : Poems by Chicanos, Eskimos, Hawaiians, Indians, Puerto Ricans in the U.S.A., with Related Poems by Others. 1st Vintage Books ed. New York. 1973. pp. 193-197

Rivera, Gloria. “Sterilization: La Operacion/ The doctor may need it more than you!.” Triple Jeopardy, no. 3, January 1, 1974, pp. 1