Decades before the overturning of
Roe v. Wade, pregnant people faced arrest and prosecution for supposed crimes against the fertilized eggs, embryos, and fetuses they gestated.
T
he Pregnancy Police investigates the legal arguments undergirding these prosecutions and sheds much-needed light on the networks of health-care providers, social workers, and legal personnel participating in this ongoing surveillance and punishment of pregnant people.
Drawing on detailed analyses of legislation, statements from prosecutors and law enforcement, and records from over a thousand arrest cases, Grace E. Howard traces the long history of state attempts to regulate and control people who have the capacity for pregnancy—from the early twentieth century’s white supremacist eugenics to the end of
Roe and the ever-increasing criminalization of abortion across the United States.
Table of Content
Contents
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. The Peril of Protection
2. Angels and Antimothers
3. Bad Breeders
4. “The Dead Babies May Be the Lucky Ones”
5. “I Felt Like Nobody”
6. Wielding the Velvet Hammer
7. Conclusion
Appendix 1: Methodology
Appendix 2: Court Cases
Notes
References
Index
About the author
Grace Howard is Associate Professor of Justice Studies at San José State University.
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