Before Roe v. Wade, the women of the Jane collective learned to give safe abortions themselves
By 1973, more than 11,000 had been performed, and not one woman died
In 1968, a young, neatly dressed mother was at home in Chicago when her telephone rang. Claire picked up, and could hear someone on the other end hesitate. She knew instantly why this woman was calling. She wanted an abortion, and Claire was one of the few people who knew how to get her one.
Roe v. Wade wouldn’t make abortion legal nationwide for another five years, and women who wanted them were forced to plead their cases to hospital boards who weighed whether the woman’s life was at risk. Often they refused the request, and those desperate enough were forced to seek abortions from providers who had little or no training, charged exorbitant rates, or demanded sexual favors in return. Botched abortions accounted for hundreds of reported deaths, not to mention the unreported ones.
When a college friend wanted to end her pregnancy, Claire (a pseudonym, her real name would later be revealed as Heather Booth) contacted a doctor she knew. Then another woman called, then another. But more than just merely connecting the women with reliable providers, she realized that the women needed information. They were terrified, had no idea what the procedure involved, felt shame, and guilt. Claire began meeting with them in person to tell them what to expect. Before long, she was getting more calls than she could handle. She gathered a group of women she knew from her other activist work for a meeting. Many of the women had had abortions themselves. The room was packed.
They began meeting regularly to discuss counseling techniques and ways to connect with providers. They picked a name: Abortion Counseling Service of Women’s Liberation, but it was too clunky. They decided that when women called, they should ask for “Jane” — the everywoman name. For the next four years, they would get calls from women of all backgrounds and ages from all over Illinois. They arranged an estimated 11,000 abortions — without a single fatality.
As Laura Kaplan, a member of the collective, explained in The Story of Jane, the women saw themselves not as advocates for abortion, but as women helping women who were turning to abortion as a last resort. Their outreach pamphlet explained “We are women whose ultimate goal is the liberation of women in society. One important way we are working toward that goal is by helping any woman who wants an abortion get one as safely and cheaply as possible under existing conditions … Only a woman who is pregnant can determine whether she has enough resources — economic, physical and emotional — at a given time to bear and rear a child.” As members recalled, the women who contacted Jane were desperate. They knew that calling an abortionist meant that they might be butchered or bleed to death, but they were willing to risk it. In case of a police raid, the organization kept as little documentation as possible.
Jenny, a founding member, had recently been diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma when she found out she was pregnant for a third time. Her last pregnancy had put such a strain on her body that she was sure this pregnancy would kill her. Because of the amount of radiation she was receiving, there was little chance that the baby would be born without defects. The hospital board refused her request for an abortion. It was only when she convinced two psychiatrists that she would commit suicide before giving birth that they granted her request. She left the experience with a helpless rage that she channeled into Jane.
“The Jane collective attained legendary status within some sectors of the women’s health community, not only for its bravado, but also for its demonstration that abortions could be done by women for women — in short, abortion could be demedicalized,” Carol E. Joffee wrote in the journal Sociology of Health and Illness. Throughout their four-year run they continually clashed with the male-dominated medical community, insisting on having more control over the procedures. Jenny began demanding to be in the room with women while they were having abortions, so she could make sure they were safe. The collective started working almost exclusively with one doctor, whom Kaplan calls “Nick,” because he allowed them to be there. But as time went on, a nagging suspicion became impossible to ignore: Nick wasn’t really a doctor.
Jane members held a meeting shortly thereafter to alert the other members. “The room exploded,” Kaplan wrote. Crying, one woman accused the women of deliberately deceiving them. Others said it discredited all their work. And then another member spoke up, “Well if he can do it, and he’s not a doctor, then we can do it too.” Jenny smiled. This had occurred to her a long time ago. In fact, Nick had already been training her to do abortions. At one point, Jenny had yelled at Nick, “Why should you have all the knowledge? Teach us.”
The revelation that Nick was not a doctor was a blow. They lost a large number of their membership — some suggested half the group — but it was a turning point. For those who remained, Jane was now the “ultimate feminist project.” Nick began training more members and they met with other experts to learn new techniques.
Nick continued to do some of the abortions, but by 1971, Jane members were mostly doing procedures themselves, which brought the cost of an abortion from $600 to $100. When they realized that many women had no medical access at all, they learned how to give pap smears, and arranged for a lab to read them for $4.
When prices fell, Jane started getting more calls from more poor and black women. Abortion for black women was doubly fraught. “They were not only burdened by society’s attitudes [toward abortion], but also by the criticism of black nationalists who identified abortion with genocide,” explained Kaplan. “Within those circles any woman seeking an abortion was considered a traitor to her race.” The Jane members were almost exclusively white, middle-class women. When a black woman named Lois came for an abortion, she reprimanded them, “You guys are the white angels that are going to save everybody and where are the black women at?” Lois decided to join Jane to help counsel the black patients. The women’s movement wasn’t speaking to black women because, as Lois put it, “we were trying to, one, deal with being black women; two, deal with prejudice; three, deal with the structure, being single parents and staying alive. That was our struggle.” But her friends cautioned her about taking part in an illegal group saying, “Those white women would get out of it, but not you. You could go to jail.”
Jane members did have several run-ins with the police. They heard through neighbors that their houses were being surveilled. Once, the police followed a patient, but she was able to warn the members, who cleaned up the surgery area and played dumb. When one member went to an anti-war rally, a police officer smiled at her and said ominously, “Hi, Jane.” The police finally caught up with them in 1973. The apartment was raided and several members were taken into custody.
But while they were out on bail, the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade, which disallowed many state restrictions on abortion. Jane members gathered to celebrate, but while the women were relieved, the celebration was subdued. As Kaplan explained, the decision of Roe v. Wade was “written emphatically in terms of physician’s rights, not women’s rights” and “revalidated the medical profession’s control of women’s reproductive health.” “What had women really won?” Kaplan wondered. “The right to more callous treatment by the medical profession?” They had finally achieved what they had set out to do — women helping women — and now men would be in charge again.
