We’re familiar with the argument that reproductive rights are a necessary component of the right to privacy, but the state-level abortion bans that have proliferated since the court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization have shown us, tragically, just how many other constitutional rights are at stake. “Reports of pregnant women bleeding for days without medical intervention, criminal prosecutions involving miscarriages, women suffering near-fatal conditions such as sepsis before fleeing their home states for care elsewhere, children forced to give birth after being raped, and people being denied abortions in cases involving nonviable fetuses or those deceased in utero are no longer uncommon,” writes law professor Michele Goodwin in an important essay for The Nation. This “trail of horrors,” Goodwin explains, not only violates the 13th Amendment (forcing women and pregnant people into an “involuntary servitude” that calls to mind the horrors of slavery) and the 14th Amendment (abridging their life and liberty) but puts the rule of law itself at risk.

To mark this moment—its perils, yet also the promise of millions of galvanized citizens infuriated by the overturning of Roe—ReproNation founder and Nation editor Regina Mahone, with her cohost (and Nation contributor) Renee Bracey Sherman, have launched the podcast The A Files: A Secret History of Abortion. At the start of a critical election year in which abortion will play a pivotal role, The A Files seeks to dismantle the widespread misperceptions about abortion and instead discover the truth, from the hidden history of this very common practice, to how some of the most popular pro-choice slogans are actually stigmatizing, to the pop-culture stereotypes about who chooses abortion. Regina and Renee also bring in scholars and activists who work on reproductive justice and offer their suggestions on great books that tell diverse and honest stories about abortion, both in literature and in real life.

Yours in solidarity,

Emily Douglas

Senior Editor

In Lux magazine, Victoria Law and Aviva Stahl talked to activists inside prisons who are trying to make abortion more accessible for fellow incarcerated women and pregnant people.

In the Post and Courier, Jocelyn Grzeszczak and Eva Herscowitz examine the prosecutions of pregnant women for drug abuse in South Carolina. Nearly 200 women have been prosecuted since 2006.

From NPR: Researchers estimate that 65,000 pregnancies were caused by rape in states with abortion bans.

From Mother Jones: Kansans resoundingly defeated an attempt to take abortion rights out of the state’s constitution last year. But now Republican state legislators are trying to pass a bill that would ban abortion there.

How to Use Abortion Pills

The Miscarriage and Abortion Hotline

If/When/How Repro Legal Helpline

Charley, the Abortion Chatbot

Digital Security and Abortion Guide

Find Help Paying for an Abortion

Abortion Access for a Young Person

Abortion Access for Immigrants

Pregnancy Criminalization, Explained