Long before the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that gave women the choice to terminate a pregnancy, San Franciscans were charting a path for safer reproductive care in The City and far beyond.
Among the earliest in The City’s recorded history is abortion access pioneer Patricia Maginnis. Born in Oklahoma in 1928, Maginnis found her way to California and San Francisco at a time when abortion was still illegal across the United States. In interviews, she has said she knew from a young age she didn’t want to have children and lamented the tortuous process women had to go through in order to get abortion care during the ‘50s and ‘60s.
“No other medical procedure has to be legislated,” reads a pamphlet handed out by the Society for Human Abortion. “Pat helped people work the system. She taught them how to fake psychosis in order to get cleared for an abortion. She was a character, and a very influential character,” said Carole Joffe, author and sociologist of reproductive health and politics.When abortion was criminalized in the 19th century, it didn’t mean there couldn’t be any abortions anywhere. It meant that only doctors could decide which abortions were reasonable or acceptable and which weren’t, according to Joffe.
In response to the S.F. Nine, physicians and activists in San Francisco continued to push their movement forward.
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