We did it. Natasha Hellerich When the decision was delivered on Jan. 22, 1973, legalizing abortion throughout the United States, Wolfson quickly petitioned the district attorney, and all charges were dropped. Prior to the Roe v. Wade case, the so-called "Janes" built the underground organization and assisted an estimated 11,000 women. And many documentary filmmakers have used their medium over the years to reflect on what led to the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision and what historical and political developments have led to the continued debate over a womans right to choose. So we thought, we can be of use. Excellent, important, timely, urgent, and needs to be seen and discussed widely., Peter Coleman, expert and author of The Way Out. Judith Arcana was one of them. In the spring of 2012, the film began screening in film festivals in Florida and over the next two years it screened in festivals all over the world, winning many competitions, prizes, and awards. Documentary filmmaker and video producer Aaron Hos, representing the UCF Center for Distributed Learning (CDL), was brought onto the project as Producer and Supervising Editor. This documentary, accompanied by dozens of in-depth interviews published as part of the FRONTLINE Transparency Project, examined then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnells decades-long campaign to transform the nations highest court and its profound implications. KAREN GRAVES by removing unnecessary regulations on certain drugs. 11: New York allows abortion on demand up to the 24th week of pregnancy, as Gov. FRONTLINE goes inside the fight over abortion, told through the stories of women struggling with unplanned pregnancies. FRONTLINE has been documenting the fight over abortion for several decades. These developments follow a decades-long effort by U.S. They were so detailed in care, said Doris, whose second abortion with the collective was remarkably different from her first one, via the Mafia. ELIZABETH JENSEN-FORBELL, LOGAN KRIETE Booth tells her story in "The Janes." The documentaries below follow doctors, patients, plaintiffs and protesters through periods when politicians on both side of the aisle fought to either maintain or dismantle the Roe v. Wade verdict all these years later. Madeline McComish (top row, center), a retired chemist, is past president of Massachusetts Citizens for Life. The Labrant family's YouTube documentary on abortion was met with immediate contempt on social media. Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City in Kansas, outgoing chair of the USCCB's Committee on Pro-Life Activities, presents pro-life initiative Walking with Moms in Need to the U.S. bishops in . A new documentary series warns about the dangers of chemical abortions, as the Biden Administration has recently removed restrictions on the abortion pill . The institutions that serve us are not broken they are working according to their design. They drove women to and from appointments, explained how the process would unfold and babysat their children while they underwent the procedure. Similar laws are passed in Alaska, Hawaii, and Washington state. To help you learn more about the history behind this courts contentious ruling, TheWrap has gathered five essential documentaries to watch. Ending the constitutional right to abortion has had far-reaching, and in some cases life-threatening risks, the authors write including for those seeking miscarriage care, those forced to travel across state lines for abortion, and those denied care for potentially fatal complications such as ectopic pregnancies. Florida Film Festival 2013 And then it was time to do something else. DAVID MORAN Send questions and comments to Lisa.Mills@ucf.edu. For decades, underground networksaround the world from El Salvador to Poland to Mexico to right here in the United States have been and are assisting pregnant people obtain the abortion care that they need. DEL BARCO: The Janes hired an attorney who had represented the Black Panthers. The Supreme Courts Dobbs decision has successfully overturned a womans federal right to an abortion; nearly 50 years later, Roe v. Wade is no longer the law of the land. Rather, to invoke Ijeoma Oluo, they are working according to their design. Abortion: Stories Women Tell is streaming on HBO Max. used by permission and protected by the Some women tried to self-induce abortions using objects or chemicals, which often led to infection and sometimes death. Powerful evidence of the unimaginable., Clara Germani, The Christian Science Monitor. Cassanello, Mills, Hos and their former students launched a fundraising campaign to cover the cost of licensing images and music in the film. Members were able to set up a much more compassionate setting that was respectful to women, she said. Here are two documentaries that offer context to the Supreme Court's ruling on abortion. Connecticut Gov. Among the signatories are the Global Justice Center, Pregnancy Justice, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. MONICA MONTICELLO, MONICA MONTICELLO In 2009, one of the very few remaining providers of third-trimester abortions in the country, Dr. George Tiller, was shot to death. And how they are designed, to maintain the white-supremacist patriarchy, means that they will continue to harm and criminalize women, queer and trans and racially marginalized people no matter what the law says. The students who made the film graduated, but stayed in touch with Cassanello and Mills about the films success. Michael Hugo resigned as the chair of the Framingham Democratic Committee in Massachusetts on Thursday following weeks of backlash for complaining about the cost of special needs education for . Seven of the women were arrested in a police raid with charges of abortion and conspiracy to commit abortion in 1972, just before the historic Supreme Court decision. The abortion debate has long dominated political discourse on Capitol Hill, particularly in recent years. The ads were the work of an underground abortion network started by University of Chicago student Heather Booth that helped an estimated 11,000 Chicago women obtain safe and affordable abortions before Roe v. Wade was handed down. the committee documentary abortionthe renaissance apartments chicago. In fall 2011, professors Robert Cassanello and Lisa Mills taught an Advanced Documentary Workshop class at the University of Central Florida. Several decades after Roe v. Wade, the anti-abortion movement had successfully spearheaded campaigns in multiple states, passing laws that limited access to abortion including in Mississippi, where a single facility performing abortions remained. Copyright 2022 NPR. Though illegal under Illinois law, the Janes, as they called . June: National Right to Life brings together state . Home Video DVDs of The Abortion Divideare available from ShopPBS. Call Jane.. AMY SIMPSON, UCF College of Arts & Humanities Web Team, LOU ELLEN KRAMER For years, illegitimate authorities have been chipping away, state by state, rule by rule, impacting women's lives on the most intimate decision of our life. ET June 8), takes you inside an underground network of women providing access to affordable, safe and illegal abortions in Chicago, in the 1960s and 1970s. CHUCK WOODS The movie focuses on the tale of a real person, Abby Johnson, a former director of Planned Parenthood, who claims she left the organization after witnessing a 13-week abortion on an ultrasound.. Suncoast Emmy Awards 2014, Broadcast Education Association Festival of Media Arts 2012, Atlanta's Out On Film LGBT Film Festival 2014 The students, with backgrounds in English, accounting, journalism, computer engineering, art, and radio/TV production, were assigned into production teams where they would best be able to use their abilities. DEL BARCO: Posting the phone number on bulletin boards and underground newspapers, the Janes set up a clandestine system. Signatories in the letter list prior actions from the UN Human Rights Committees over abortion access in countries such as Ireland and El Salvador, arguing for similar scrutiny of the US. So we had about over 100 counts of felony homicide against us, each of us. Abortion reversal laws are based on contested science but states keep passing them. The collectives origin story is not unlike the origin stories of other movements: A call for help catalyzes an action, which results in another related action, and another. After Tiller is an essential watch to understand the emotional and misunderstood elements of the late-term abortion debate. The authors say the curtailment of abortion rights in the US is of a piece with the countrys history of devaluing the lives of Black women, who are hit worst by abortion restrictions. That was it. Maryland House of Delegates Speaker Adrienne A. Jones gestures to Gov. Washington D.C., Jun 23, 2021 / 09:00 am. Released in 2018, Just after Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement from the Supreme Court, Reversing Roe examines how the abortion debate became more heated than ever before. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and conservative allies to secure an ideological majority on the Supreme Court a successful push FRONTLINE chronicled in the 2020 documentary Supreme Revenge: Battle for the Court. It uses medicine or surgery to remove the embryo or fetus and placenta from the uterus. And for too long, the US has been able to avoid that type of international scrutiny, she said. This documentary tells the story of a young doctor named Rebecca Gomperts. Gasparilla International Film Festival 2012. Abortion restrictions compound economic, social, and geographic barriers to healthcare, including contraception, disproportionately impacting Black womens ability to access the care we need.. Footnote 1 The chair of the Republican National Committee, Mary Louise Smith, supported abortion rights, as did First Lady Betty Ford, who declared Roe v. Wade a "great, great decision." Likewise, Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, who had taken a leading role in the fight for abortion rights in New York in the late 1960s and early 1970s . But now, without having to pay Mike, they remodeled their payment service by reducing the price from $500 to $100 and offering a pay-what-you-can option. Directed by Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes, this film spotlights the Chicago-based underground abortion network called The Jane Collective. The complexion changed, noted Marie Leaner, one of the only Black women in the collective. Nicki Nichols Gamble (top row, right) was the President of Planned Parenthood League of MA at the time of the clinic shootings and throughout the six yearlong dialogues. Legislation across the U.S. indicates that states are bracing for the potential of a post-Roe world. UCF Office of Instructional Resources The film traces the committee's origins in the era of McCarthyism and anti-gay propaganda while detailing the personal stories of those intimately involved with its activities. Find out in the 2015 documentary Outbreak, newly available to stream on FRONTLINEs YouTube channel. JOHN TILESTON But for what it's worth, I didn't ask how often or when at all it might happen. The letter sent on Thursday was addressed to a number of UN agencies and officials, including the Working Group on Discrimination against Women and Girls; the Special Rapporteur on Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; and the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Privacy. More 33 mins 13 Jun 2018. It has repeatedly called on States parties to the CEDAW Convention to remove punitive measures for women who undergo abortion and to legalize abortion at least in cases of rape, incest, threats to the life or health of the pregnant woman and girls . As the day nears that the Supreme Court might overturn Roe v. Wade, the directors said they hoped viewers would draw inspiration from the former Janes.. JUDITH POUCHER Rev. Essential Partners Abortions happened long before Roe v. Wade, and they will continue to happen long after its apparently imminent demise. Members of the Jane Collective, an underground . We came together to do something at a time when it was most needed, collective member Laura Kaplan said at the documentarys conclusion. Interviews with former members and with women who sought their services are interwoven in the documentary with archival footage from septic abortion wards in Chicago hospitals, where women who had illegal abortions or tried to induce their own often wound up with infections and sometimes took their last breaths alone. DEL BARCO: Then they'd move to another Jane's home, what they called the place. ARCANA: I think that folks who watch this film will be prompted to ask themselves, what would I do? Even before last year's Supreme Court overturning of Roe v. Wade, a recent international surge in films about abortion rights and the endangerment thereof from period pieces like . Additional funding is provided by the Abrams Foundation; the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation; Park Foundation; the Heising-Simons Foundation; and the FRONTLINE Journalism Fund with major support from Jon and Jo Ann Hagler on behalf of the Jon L. Hagler Foundation, and additional support from Koo and Patricia Yuen. This renewed interest is of course not a coincidence. DORRIE BARRON: I was petrified. Roe v. Wade Appears Poised to Fall. Columbia/SONY, Inc. Anita Bryant Orange Juice Advertisement Enlarge this image. A new documentary tells the story of "The Jane Collective," a group that helped women with nowhere else to turn for a safe abortion, in the days before Roe v. Wade. Experts believe that the use of a law traditionally used against physical threats could change the landscape. In fall 2011, professors Robert Cassanello and Lisa Mills taught an Advanced Documentary Workshop class at the University of Central Florida. The assurance, the trust, the respect I got when I tell you they changed my life, they changed my life., She added, holding back tears, When I saw women caring about women it was a whole new world for me., The Jane Collective is estimated to have provided around 11,000 abortions from 1969 to 1973. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. Actress Sarah Jessica Parker narrates the piece, acknowledging briefly in the introduction that her own family faced financial difficulties during her childhood. But finding women who actually obtained abortions from the Janes was more difficult. This was a pivotal shift within the collective, not only in the services they provided but whom they provided them to: They never turned any woman away, no matter her financial situation. They were unable to fathom that the women could do the work themselves. Web Site Copyright 1995-2023 WGBH Educational Foundation. O n the day Angela Saini talks to me from her book-lined study in New York, the patriarchy is hard at work all over the world. Melissa Kogut (bottom row, center) wasExecutive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice MA at the time of the clinic shootings and throughout the six yearlong dialogues. June 8, 2022. Jane was born first as a continuation of Booths referral service, and then as a counseling service. In the ward at the former Cook County Hospital in Chicago, now John H. Stroger, Jr. Hospital of Cook County, death was a common occurrence, according to a 2019 BuzzFeed essay written by Allan Weiland, who worked in the ward as a medical student and appears in The Janes.. LEARNING INSTITUTE FOR ELDERS (L.I.F.E.) Her civil rights activism also introduced her to Dr. T.R.M. Shout Gladi Gladi. FRONTLINE goes inside the fight over abortion, told through the stories of women struggling with unplanned pregnancies. We tried to do it with as much respect and understanding as we could.. House Bill 4006 repeals the 1931 law, which states it's illegal for any individual, mainly doctors, to assist . Filmmakers Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes wish their new HBO documentary, The Janes about a group of Chicago women who covertly helped thousands safely obtain abortions in the late . While serving as an usher at his Wichita, Kansas, church, Dr. Tiller was killed by an anti-abortion extremist. Vessel premiered at SXSW Film Festival in 2014, winning the Audience Award for Documentary in Competition and a Special Jury Award for Political Courage. In reality, the Jane Collective was not unique. Scott Goldberg ACOG Committee Opinion No. The class sought out interviews with experts who could speak with authority on the Johns Committee or the current state of LGBTQ affairs in the state of Florida. But their lawyer, Jo-Ann Wolfson, had a plan to keep delaying the court proceedings because she knew that the Supreme Court was hearing a case about another Jane Roe v. Wade. We'd love to read your comments. The documentary serves as a cautionary tale, with its release just weeks after a leak from the U.S. Supreme Court suggested the landmark 1973 ruling that established abortion rights nationwide . Some eventually began performing abortions themselves after the older man they previously relied on, who used the code name Dr. U.S. lawmakers began a wide-ranging two-year investigation into U.S. strategic competition with China Tuesday night, with testimony from Chinese human rights activists and former U.S. national . RICHARD HARRISON There's reason for people on opposing sides of abortion to talk, even if they disagree Kate Isaacs, Excellent, important, timely, urgent and needs to be seen and discussed widely Peter Coleman, Founding Executive Director of the Advanced Consortium on Cooperation, Conflict and Complexity (AC4) at The Earth Institute at Columbia University and author of. FLORIDA MOVING IMAGE ARCHIVES, UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA, SMATHERS LIBRARY SPECIAL AND AREA STUDIES COLLECTIONS, UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA The description of the arrest of seven Janes is almost comical. And while showing how the collective was informed by the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, the documentary misses an opportunity to situate the Janes work within both a historical and global context. The Florida Orange Growers Association, UCF Burnett Honors College Directors: Erik Cieslewicz, Brooke Sperry | Stars: Dino Corvino, Liz Hayes, Chrystina Head, Frances Irwin 9. Web Site Copyright 1995-2023 WGBH Educational Foundation. Have you watched the film on your local PBS station? Some would die. / 54m. But when youre talking about people and their hopes to better themselves economically, you can tell some wonderful stories., Drawing a parallel to the U.S. House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021 Capitol attack, Himes said, They radically changed the way a congressional committee communicates with the American public and we did the same thing with this documentary.. New HBO documentary 'The Janes' examines pre-Roe v. Wade underground abortion network The group helped an estimated 11,000 women in Chicago get access to safe, affordable abortions in the late. The US must be castigated on the world stage for its treatment of women, girls and others who can become pregnant the scale and intensity of human rights violations that the US is inflicting on its population are near unfathomable at this point, said Christine Ryan, legal director of the Global Justice Center, in a phone interview. The development of medication abortion has vastly changed the landscape. Documentary shows how women ran underground abortion network before Roe v. Wade ruling, according to a 2019 BuzzFeed essay written by Allan Weiland. MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: The. SYLVANA FERNNDEZ later, the body is removed and disposed of as medical waste. ! they shouted, going from room to room looking for a male physician. At the center of two separate symbolic victories for pro-choice and pro-life advocates, McCorvey makes a deathbed confession that she was paid by anti-abortion groups like Operation Rescue to speak out against abortion later in life. The documentary explores how the killings ignited a fierce debate about the intersection of free speech, abortion and religion and contributed to a Massachusetts law allowing a 35-foot buffer. I cried with her: the diary of a doctor navigating a total abortion ban. Mandalit del Barco, NPR News. You need an abortion. The constant threat of not just being arrested for getting an abortion but for even talking about one which was a felony. They just left. You'll receive access to exclusive information and early alerts about our documentaries and investigations. IE 11 is not supported. In private meetings across the country, many are asking the same question: what next? The . Himes said he consulted friends who work in television for advice on who should narrate the piece. The experience would forever change how they speak to and about each other. The Fight For Women's Bodies Contains some upsetting scenes. They spoke all of three sentences to me the entire time. Screenings come with free resources, including the official ABORTION TALKS dialogue guide by Essential Partners. Jane filled the vacuum. Orlando Film Festival 2014 In the film, they describe taking turns helping the women who called. After her 1995 denouncement of Roe v. Wade, Jane Roe was seen as going to the other side. These documentaries offer context on how America reached this moment.