There was a time when abortions were simply a part of life in the United States.
Historian Leslie Reagan says up until around 1880, abortions were legal and widely practiced.
They were only illegal after quickening, a subjective term used to describe when a pregnant woman could feel the fetus moving.
In her book, "When Abortion Was a Crime," Reagan says, "Not even the Catholic Church believed life existed before that." Before 1880, abortion drugs were a booming business.
Those who wanted to regulate that business were mainly worried about poisoning, not as Reagan notes, moral, religious, or political issues.
But the American Medical Association began a crusade in 1857 to make abortion illegal.
In 1873, Congress passed the Comstock Law, which banned abortion drugs nationwide.
By 1880, abortion was illegal in most states, unless it was necessary to save the life of the woman.
But why?
According to Reagan, the initial desire came from physicians who wanted to push out their competition, primarily midwives and homeopaths.
