U.S. abortion rates before 1940

[fnr]

I am dedicated to eliminating abortion, but am fairly confident that overturning Roe v. Wade will do very little to attain that objective.

One of my pieces of evidence is the body of publications from before Roe v. Wade, or even before the first states started liberalizing abortion laws. I first started looking at studies published before 1970, and found that most of them referred back to a conference held in 1955 at “Arden House,” where the estimate of 200,000 - over 1,000,000 was first generated. I found the report from that conference, and though it didn’t provide exhaustive documentation of where those estimates originated, I’ve since found that the estimates are relatively consistent with publications from before the time.

Since then, I’ve done a bit of diving into studies from before 1940, at a time when induced abortion was illegal everywhere, and legalization was not part of political discussion in the U.S. I’m presenting below the results of my literature search. It’s by no means exhaustive, and I certainly welcome anyone to amend my list with other studies. I’m only including those studies of which I could find the text through Google Scholar. However, it’s truly amazing to read about how prevalent induced abortion was, as early as Reconstruction. Some of the studies are simply beyond credibility. For example, one study in 1916 estimated that if criminal abortion was eliminated, it would increase the national birth rate by 100% – in other words, the study estimated that there were as many abortions as live births in America. As one author below notes, a lot of the published studies weren’t based on very good methods. Still, the point is pretty clear that in early 20th century America (and before), abortion was perceived as a widespread problem. There are a couple of European studies included as well.

With that, here are the studies. I have presented the abstracts of the studies, or citations if no such abstract is available. The estimates from the studies are summarized here, based on publication dates. I’ll be putting each study into a reply, so it’s easier to discuss individual studies.

 

[fnr]

URL: books.google.com/books?hl=en&…ortion&f=false
REFERENCE: Criminal Abortion: Its Nature, Its Evidence, and Its Law. Horatio Robinson Storer, Franklin Fiske Heard, 1868. Page 28:
TEXT: “From these figures, there can be drawn but one conclusion – that criminal abortion prevails to an enormous extent in New York, and that it is steadily and rapidly increasing.”

 

[fnr]

REFERENCE: Onslow, H. (1913) The French Commission on Depopulation. Published in Eugenics Review.
TEXT: “Among the many causes that have their effect upon the birth-rate, one of the most important is criminal abortion, and it has tended lately to increase. In I903, 607 cases were reported, but this, no doubt, is only a very small fraction of the total number procured, which, it has been suggested, approaches the exaggerated figure of 12,000 annually. Dr. Maygrier states that out of 742 miscarriages, 5’91 per cent. were procured, and of these women 56,8 per cent. died, whereas of the others only '57 per cent. This shows that abortion affects the rate of natural increase, not only by suppressing births, but also by increasing the death-rate due to child-birth. Seeing that there has been so great an increase in the number of cases observed-according to M. Doloris from 7’7 to I7’7- and since there is no evidence of a higher percentage of cases being reported, it is to be presumed that there has also been an increase among the far more numerous cases that have been concealed.”

 

[fnr]

REFERENCE: Beckman, O.H. (1916) Abortion, and Some Suggestions How to Lessen Criminal Abortions. California State Journal of Medicine, November 1916, pp. 447-450.
TEXT: “Dr. Charles D. Ball, of Santa Ana, in his excellent article, “Criminal Abortion and the Medical Profession,” read before the Southern California Medical Association, in December, 1915, and published in the February issue of the California State Journal of Medicine, estimates that there are, at least, five millions of criminal abortions in this country every year, and that the birth rate is about two millions. Assuming one-fifth of those abortions to be repetitions, it would still leave four million individual women criminally aborted every year. If those four million would have accepted motherhood-and we grant, for the sake of convenience, that a mother devotes two years upon an individual baby-it would still leave two millions as the sum total to be added to the estimated two million viable babes born annually. In other words-if criminal abortions could be stopped -it would increase the nation’s birth rate by, at least, 100%. I fully agree with Dr. Ball that, if continued, it will annihilate the nation, or that portion of it which has been its backbone in times past.”

 

[fnr]

REFERENCE: Sellers Kennard, K. (1922) Criminal Abortion: Modern Causes and Methods of Production. 39 Medico-Legal J. 7 1922
TEXT: "*Notwithstanding the fact that numerous surveys have been made in the past and yet more recently by various medical bodies, private individuals and State authority to obtain information upon the frequency of criminal abortion, reliable statistics as to the prevalence of this crime are impossible to obtain as none are kept.

The articles which have been previously published concerning this subject were based upon information obtained from hospitals of more or less restricted areas, and physicians of limited experience, and from a reference to the literature it does not appear that the number of actually reported cases are sufficient upon which to base statistics which would be either extensive or reliable enough to assert, from a statistical viewpoint, the extreme prevalency of criminal abortion, a view which seems to be held by the majority of those who come in direct relation with the results of this crime.

Phillips, Trans. Maine Med. Asso., 1896, vol. xii, estimated upon the returns of seventy-five physicians that 63.5 per cent. of abortion in their territory were criminal.

The Michigan State Board of Health Transactions, p. 165, furnishes information based upon the reports of the Special Committee on Criminal Abortion, that 100,000 pregnancies yearly end in abortion, the larger number of which are criminal.

From 1867 to 1875 the Bureau of Vital Statistics of New York City reported 197 deaths from abortion, but admitted the great probability of error in the smallness of these numbers, and the same bureau reports for the years 1918, 19, 20, 375 abortions of which 201 were criminal.

Hegar says one abortion occurs in every eight pregnancies at full term,
but obviously does not imply that all are criminal.

In Lyons there are 10,000 abortions committed every year, according to the statement of one midwife, she herself does three weekly.

French writers on forensic medicine, notably, Tardieu, Briand et Chaude, Oliver d’Angers and Devergie, while admitting that a great number of abortions must remain unknown as to their cause, to some extent base their belief of the prevalency of criminal abortions upon the number of infants which are received each year at the morgues of France.
Tardieu says that during thirty years there were examined the bodies of 1540 foetuses of less than nine months gestation. Only 69 showed signs of induced abortion. So again we are not in possession of any reliable information as to the actual number of cases of criminal abortion.

For the four years 1918 to 1921 there has passed through the City Morgue (Bronx Borough, N. Y. C.) one hundred cases of foetuses found dead in various localities such as ash dumps, sewers, toilets, etc. The great majority of these were from five to seven months gestation, an age which would be presumptive evidence against interference by modern methods. A few were of later period but none were earlier. In but one was there evidence of criminal abortion, as was shown by wounds of the scalp and fracture of the scull, (Donner Case) and in the other (Arlock Case), although no injuries were found upon the foetus, the mother subsequently dying, presented at autopsy signs of abortion which from the attending circumstances were clearly of criminal nature.*"

 

[fnr]

URL: heinonline.org
REFERENCE: McCann, F.J. (1929) Criminal Abortions and Measures Necessary to Restrict the Sale of Abortefacient Drugs. 23 Transactions of the Medico-Legal Society 37 1928-1928. [UK Study]
TEXT: "*The amount of abortion is difficult to estimate. It is stated that about every fifth or sixth pregnancy ends in spontaneous abortion. Even higher estimates are given, while over a quarter of all abortions are stated to be criminally induced. In Hamburg in 1919, 53 per cent. as many abortions occurred as full-time deliveries.

From my own experience, I do not think 25 per cent. an overestimate although the amount must vary in different localities.

All those who have had experience in the treatment of female diseases must admit that the proportion of criminal abortions is very high, and has increased since the Great War. For one case that comes under public notice there are literally hundreds which remain unknown.*"

 

[fnr]

URL: ajog.org/article/S0002-93…756-4/abstract
REFERNCE: Taussig, F.J. (1931) Abortion in relation to fetal and maternal welfare. American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology. Volume 22, Issue 6, Pages 868–878.
TEXT:
“1. An estimate of 700,000 abortions annually in the United States is certainly no exaggeration of the actual condition. There is every reason to believe that an increase in this number is taking place with each decade similar to the experiences of other civilized countries.
2. This increase is the result partly of the decreased infant mortality, partly arises from the changed social and economic status of woman, and partly is the outcome of economic conditions resulting from the World War.
3. The increase is noticed primarily among married women who have three or more children.
4. All efforts to control the incidence of criminal abortion by legislation have resulted in failure.
5. Birth control may prove a factor in the reduction of criminal abortions, especially if more reliable contraceptive measures are discovered.
6. The maternal death loss from abortion in the United States has been estimated as 15,000 annually. Deaths from puerperal sepsis following abortions are relatively seven times as frequent as those from puerperal sepsis after childbirth.
7. The Russian experiment with legalized abortion indicates a definitely lower maternal mortality with operations done openly in hospitals than with secret, illegal operations as formerly.
8. A decrease in maternal mortality can be expected from improving the training of medical students and physicians in the proper management of abortion cases and from an increased knowledge concerning the prevention and treatment of septic infection.
9. The abortion problem, so vital to the human race, demands more careful and more open study, free from the trammels of political or religious dogma. Women should be taught to respect their duties, as mothers, to the social state, and the state in turn should be made to feel its obligations to motherhood, granting such relief, financial and otherwise, especially to those with many children, as will to the greatest degree avoid economic distress and promote the physical wellbeing of the mother.
10. The women of this country should be told that interference with pregnancy, even in its earliest stages, is not the harmless procedure they generally seem to consider it to be, but is a procedure inevitably associated with considerable risk to life and especially to future health.”

 

[fnr]

URL: ajph.aphapublications.org/doi…/AJPH.28.5.621 – The paper is free online.
REFERENCE: Stix, R.E., Wiehl, D.G. Abortion and the Public Health. American Journal of Public Health, Volume 28, Pages 621-628, May 1938.
TEXT: None. See Table I, page 622, showing estimates of % of pregnancies ending in illegal abortion for different sampling locations. Estimates range from 2.1% to 22.1%.

 

[fnr]

URL: ajog.org/article/S0002-93…065-7/abstract
REFERENCE: Simons, J.H. (1939) Statistical analysis of one thousand abortions. American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, Volume 37, Issue 5, Pages 840–849.
TEXT:
“1. One thousand cases of abortion are reported.
2. There is evidence of increasing number of abortions, principally in the self-induced group.
3. Religion does not seem to be a deterrent to induction of abortion.
4. As Taussig states, “abortion is a problem concerned with the married woman,” both induced and criminal, and it is in this group that the high death rate is contained.
5. Most spontaneous and induced abortions occur under three months and most often under 30 years of age, increasing again in incidence after 35. The criminal abortions occur in greatest percentage in single women and early married life.
6. The total abortion incidence is 1 abortion to 2.7 pregnancies and 1 abortion to 1.6 confinements. This is according to the histories of our abortion cases. The relation of hospital abortion to hospital confinements is as 1:5.3 and stillbirths to abortions as 1:5.2.
7. Hemorrhage is a factor in lowering the resistance of the patient but not in the mortality.
8. Missed abortions were of 0.3 per cent incidence; therapeutic abortions 0.5 per cent.
9. The mortality rate was 1.9 per cent with the most frequent complications septicemia, peritonitis, pneumonia, phlebitis, and distant infarcts.
10. Operative incidence 51 per cent.
11. We have followed the conservative treatment established, here by Adair and Litzenberg, that is, in septic cases, we use expectant treatment unless complicated by hemorrhage; incision of abscesses if properly located, later evacuation if necessary when there is approximately normal leucocyte count and temperature for a period of at least five days. The sedimentation time does not seem to be of much value here. Nonseptic cases are evacuated, almost routinely, to conserve blood and shorten hospitalization. Repeated transfusions are of particular value in infected cases, and of course those with hemorrhage. Nearly all cases with a hemoglobin of 60 per cent or less received one or more transfusions. Sulfanilamide seems to give promise of potent therapy.
12. Invalidism, more or less permanent, and the high maternal mortality of abortion may hopefully be combated through improvement in moral and economic standards, education in family limitation, and early prenatal care. Endocrine and vitamin therapy may eliminate many of the spontaneous abortions.”

 

[phil19034]

It doesn’t really matter what the numbers were before Roe v Wade. It was simply a lot lower and not used as a legal form of birth control. Only criminals did it. Even if that was their first crime… They were criminals because they broke the law.

There have always been murders since the offspring of Adam and Eve.

Changing the law will never eliminate all abortions, but it will drop the numbers dramatically.

Besides, abortion was around in the Roman Empire before Christ was born.

Having laws against evil doesn’t destroy or stop evil, only God can do that. But having laws that condones or legalizes evil allows it to infect more people, as people in society lose the ability to recognize evil.

 

[PaulfromIowa]

I am dedicated to eliminating abortion, but am fairly confident that overturning Roe v. Wade will do very little to attain that objective.

First, Roe v. Wade is very false constitutional law. Even the pro-abort Justice Ginsburg has admitted this. It should be overturned regardless of the abortion rate.

Respect for human life demands the legal protection of innocent life. The fact that murders happen every day is no reason to legalize murder.

Your “studies” are not studies but simply wild assertions. The motives are either sensationalism, (five million abortions in the US in 1915?), or pro-abortion advocacy. These claims do not even agree with each other. There was certainly an illegal abortion trade in the US before the 1960’s but it did not compare to the legal abortion industry which spread after Roe v. Wade.

 

[MacBP]

Most women don’t choose to have an abortion willy-nilly; they do so out of the kind of fear and desperation that would drive them to have one regardless of its legal status. As a result, I don’t think anyone should be surprised to learn that abortions prevalent before it was legalized. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that our society is not a kind place for women who find themselves with an unplanned pregnancy. As long as we fail to give unexpected mothers the help and support that they need, abortion will be a reality.

So any pro-life strategy will need to address both the legality of abortion and its root cause. Abortion should absolutely be illegal; any civilized society should criminalize the murder of innocent human beings, but until we get serious about helping women in crisis pregnancies at a national scale, we can’t seriously expect to eliminate abortions.

 

[dmelosi]

Most women don’t choose to have an abortion willy-nilly; they do so out of the kind of fear and desperation that would drive them to have one regardless of its legal status. As a result, I don’t think anyone should be surprised to learn that abortions prevalent before it was legalized. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that our society is not a kind place for women who find themselves with an unplanned pregnancy. As long as we fail to give unexpected mothers the help and support that they need, abortion will be a reality.

So any pro-life strategy will need to address both the legality of abortion and its root cause. Abortion should absolutely be illegal; any civilized society should criminalize the murder of innocent human beings, but until we get serious about helping women in crisis pregnancies at a national scale, we can’t seriously expect to eliminate abortions.

I would be curious where you get that most women have an abortion out of fear and desperation that would have them get one regardless of its legal status.

from operationrescue.org/about-abortion/abortions-in-america/

• 21% Inadequate finances
• 21% Not ready for responsibility
• 16% Woman’s life would be changed too much
• 12% Problems with relationships, unmarried
• 11% Too young and/or immature
• 8% Children are grown; she has all she wants
• 3% Baby has possible health problems
• <1% Pregnancy caused by rape/incest
• 4% Other

from abort73.com/abortion_facts/us_abortion_statistics/

WHY DO ABORTIONS OCCUR?
On average, women give at least 3 reasons for choosing abortion: 3/4 say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or other responsibilities; about 3/4 say they cannot afford a child; and 1/2 say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner (AGI).
Only 12% of women included a physical problem with their health among reasons for having an abortion (NAF).
One per cent (of aborting women) reported that they were the survivors of rape (NAF).

 

[FreeEver]

First, Roe v. Wade is very false constitutional law.

Even the pro-abort Justice Ginsburg has admitted this. It should be overturned regardless of the abortion rate.
.

Your statement is one that I have pondered over many a time.

There are now six Catholic Justices on the U. S. Supreme Court, with five of them leaning toward a conservative tilt. Why can’t a pro life – anti abortion case go forward? Some “gun slinging” Harvard – Yale law firm could easily challenge the law and take it to the Supreme Court? In the U.S., money talks and why no top NYC or Wash D.C. conservative law firm (with Harvard – Yale degrees) takes up the case perplexes me. YES, they can be bought ($$$$$$) in this current U.S. culture.

With the new advanced technology of Sonograms and Ultrasound, the embryo is alive at least one month of age, perhaps earlier.

IMHO, I think I know why, but it best not be discussed because it’s a political hot potato that would adversely affect one of our political parties.

God Bless and Peace to all.

 

[_Abyssinia]

Even if there was no difference from one day to the next if abortion was made illegal, and people found other ways to get abortions, it should still be illegal. Government, courts etc. should send the message that procuring an abortion is not advisable or acceptable.

 

[fnr]

Your “studies” are not studies but simply wild assertions. The motives are either sensationalism, (five million abortions in the US in 1915?), or pro-abortion advocacy. These claims do not even agree with each other. There was certainly an illegal abortion trade in the US before the 1960’s but it did not compare to the legal abortion industry which spread after Roe v. Wade.

As I said in the top post, I am citing studies based on what is published in the scholarly literature that was available at the time. In particular, I used scholar.google.com (and possibly www.pubmed.org) to conduct these searches. These are the identical types of search methods that are employed by academic researchers today to find studies that represent the background of literature associated with their research. As I said in the top post, I invite anyone to cite other studies in this thread. I would love to have greater literature that represents the total evidence.

To say that these studies are “simply wild assertions” is itself a blanket assertion that seems to be totally unsupported by reading the studies themselves. While a number of the studies probably used poor methods, as was noted in the study in Post #5 of this thread and I noted in the top post, these studies represent the professional opinion of medical and public health scholars of the time.

Of course “sensationalism” could be one of the issues under these articles, but to say that they’re pro-abortion is totally off mark. The study in which the 5 million abortion estimate is found was published in the California State Journal of Medicine, which was the journal of the professional association for physicians in California. The journal was published (under changing titles) until 1998, when it was purchased by the British Medical Journal, which ceased its publication.

If you don’t like these studies because of what they estimate is the numbers of illegal abortions, please conduct your own research into the literature that was available at the time and share it here! I really want to have as much objective evidence as we can have in this discussion. Every person has a bias, so we should be clear about that. But if we get everything that was published we can at least see who published what, and use our own judgment to see if the publications represent true science or just opinions dressed up as science.

 

[Sunbreak]

I would be curious where you get that most women have an abortion out of fear and desperation that would have them get one regardless of its legal status.

from operationrescue.org/about-abortion/abortions-in-america/

• 21% Inadequate finances
• 21% Not ready for responsibility
• 16% Woman’s life would be changed too much
• 12% Problems with relationships, unmarried
• 11% Too young and/or immature
• 8% Children are grown; she has all she wants
• 3% Baby has possible health problems
• <1% Pregnancy caused by rape/incest
• 4% Other

from abort73.com/abortion_facts/us_abortion_statistics/

WHY DO ABORTIONS OCCUR?
On average, women give at least 3 reasons for choosing abortion: 3/4 say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or other responsibilities; about 3/4 say they cannot afford a child; and 1/2 say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner (AGI).
Only 12% of women included a physical problem with their health among reasons for having an abortion (NAF).
One per cent (of aborting women) reported that they were the survivors of rape (NAF).

I don’t get what you don’t understand about MacBP’s post. Yes, many women do get abortions out of fear of just the things you listed.
Fear of inadequate finances.
Fear of not being ready for responsibility
Fear of life being changed too much
etc.

 

[dmelosi]

I don’t get what you don’t understand about MacBP’s post. Yes, many women do get abortions out of fear of just the things you listed.
Fear of inadequate finances.
Fear of not being ready for responsibility
Fear of life being changed too much
etc.

For some reason you left out the desperation part.

 

[fnr]

Rather than discussing the overall number of abortions per year, some historical studies can be used to calculate another number reported by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the “abortion ratio.” That is the number of abortions per 1,000 live births. For the year 2010, the CDC estimates the ratio to be 228 (per 1000 live births).

Here’s the equation I propose to do calculate the historical ratio:
**
ABORTION_RATIO = ABORTIONS PER 1000 LIVE BIRTHS =
(MATERNAL ABORTION DEATHS PER 1000 LIVE BIRTHS)
/
(MATERNAL DEATHS PER 1000 ABORTIONS)**

While before 1940, there was no official record of the total abortions per year, mortality statistics did track deaths that resulted from abortion. Furthermore, we don’t know the exact risk of dying associated with getting an illegal abortion before 1970. However, we can use studies from the time to estimate the ratio.

MATERNAL ABORTION DEATHS PER 1000 LIVE BIRTHS

I found a very detailed study, cited below, in which the author tracked down every single cause of pregnancy-related death in Cleveland, Ohio during the year 1931.

Here is the reference:
REFERENCE: Bolt, Richard A. (1933) Maternal mortality study for Cleveland, Ohio. American Journal of Public Health and the Nation’s Health, Volume 23, Issue 2, pp. 109-113. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.23.2.109. [Available at http://dx.doi.org]

In this paper, Bolt reports the following statistics. It’s free online. You’re free to look it up.

Deaths following “criminal abortion”: 12
Live births: 16279
MATERNAL ABORTION DEATHS PER 1000 LIVE BIRTHS: 0.74

---

MATERNAL DEATHS PER 1000 ABORTIONS

Again, we don’t know how many total abortions there actually were back when abortion was illegal. However, I found a study from 1977 that reported the “death-to-case” ratio for legal abortion in the United States for the years 1972-1974.

Here is the study.

REFERENCE: Cates, W.; Grimes, D.A., Smith, J.C., Tyler, C.W. (1977) Legal abortion mortality in the United States. Epidemiologic surveillance, 1972-1974. Journal of the American Medical Association 237(5): 452-455. doi:10.1001/jama.1977.03270320030017

Quote: “As determined by the Center for Disease Control’s epidemiologic surveillance of abortion mortality, the death-to-case rate for legal abortion in the United States for the three years 1972 to 1974 was 3.9/100,000 procedures.”

1972-1974 DEATHS PER 1000 ABORTIONS = 0.039.

Now, it’s likely that in 1931 in Cleveland, the abortions taking place there were much less safe than those that occurred legally in the 1970s. As such, I’d like to propose a “Hazard Ratio” as a multiplier of how many more women died per 1000 abortions in 1931 vs. 1972-4.

In the Bolt paper, 5 of the 12 deaths following a criminal abortion were traced to midwives, which were later turned over to physicians.

I’ll propose a range of “Hazard Ratios,” from 1-10.

So for the equation above,
MATERNAL DEATHS PER 1000 ABORTIONS (in 1933) =
1972-1974 DEATHS PER 1000 ABORTIONS = 0.039
x
HAZARD RATIO (1-10).

With those estimates in hand, the abortion ratios can be calcluated for 1931.

Here are the results, shown as follows: Hazard Ratio / Abortion Ratio

1 / 210
2 / 105
5 / 42
10 / 21

Compare these estimates of the abortion ratio in 1931, that is the number of abortions to 1000 live births with the estimates from CDC for the year 2010, which is 228.

Clearly, the abortion ratios were lower in 1931, but they were still quite significant. If we think abortions in 1931 were as dangerous as they were in 1972-1974, these results suggest that there were almost as many abortions (per 1000 live births) in 1931 as in 2010 – only 8% fewer. If we assume that 1931 abortion was much more dangerous than in 1972-1974 (hazard ratio of 10), then the abortion ratio in 1931 would be about 91% lower than it was today.

 

[MJJean]

We know that there were successful abortions performed via herbs, teas , by taking medications known to cause miscarriage, etc, but we’ll never really know the numbers. Women were doing it, but they certainly weren’t talking openly about it even to their own family.

We’ll also never know how many maternal deaths occurred during attempts to abort because not every death was reported as being related to an attempted abortion. Many of those deaths were likely listed as accidental poisonings or overdoses. Some were probably listed as hemorrhaging during miscarriage. Not to mention we’re talking about an era when records weren’t as meticulously kept, an awful lot of info was reported by family members who either didn’t know or wouldn’t tell, and when an official would record the cause of death as something much less scandalous to the surviving family.

Really, all we do know is that women have been aborting their babies for thousands of years and that today it is legal in some countries to have an abortion performed by a medical doctor.