Reproductive Rights and the Law

Abstract

The history of the control of women and children parallels the history of reproductive rights and the law. Many believe that the new women’s movement really began when the rights of a woman to choose if and when she would bear a child became legal. There are some who believe that the institution of monogamous marriage itself was created by men who needed to know who their progeny were and only if they found a way to keep women monogamous would that be a certainty. This may make sense given the history of the marriage contract indicating that those who entered into marriage became one body and the governance of that body was by men who retained all the rights. For example, Susan Brownmiller, in her book, Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape suggests that in olden days when we were a nomadic people, women married one man to keep from being raped by many men.