"The express guarantee of equal protection was originally designed to protect black people. Since that time, its protection has been greatly extended.... Most recently federal estate courts have begun to apply the guarantees of the equal protection of the laws to prohibit discrimination against women.... Despite the fact that women are entitled to the equal protection of the laws, one major area in which they are daily denied that protection is in the area of abortion. Man and woman have equal responsibility for the act of sexual intercourse. Should the woman accidentally become pregnant, against her will, however, she endures in many instances the entire burden or “punishment.” In obtaining an abortion, the threats and punishments fall on the woman. This happens even where the decision to have an abortion has been a mutual one. Only the woman is subjected to the variety of threats which often accompany the painful search for abortion—the threats of frightened or hostile doctors of giving her name to the police—the threat of subpoena and/or prosecution if the doctor who would help her is arrested."
January 1, 1970