Mifepristone in the Context of American Abortion History

Abstract

The FDA's approval of the drug known as mifepristone, or RU 486, brought the thirty-year-old abortion controversy in the U.S. to a new pitch. Available in France since 1988, it took American proponents another twelve years to secure governmental permission for the socalled “abortion pill.” To better understand some of the implications of the legalization of an earlypregnancy abortifacient, this article examines pertinent aspects of the history of abortion in the U.S. The first section of the paper draws on a large body of historical literature to review what we know about abortion in the American past, especially who had abortions, the methods most commonly used, and the repeated attempts to repressaortion. The second part of the article considers aspects of RU 486 in light of this U.S. history.