What was the first country to legalize abortion?
Timeline of reproductive rights legislation
1918 - In the United States, Margaret Sanger was charged under the New York law against disseminating contraceptive information. On appeal, her conviction was reversed on the grounds that contraceptive devices could legally be promoted for the cure and prevention of disease.[15] 1920 – Lenin legalized all abortions in the Soviet Union.[16] 1931– Mexico as first country in the world legalized abortion in case of rape.[17] 1932– Poland as first country in Europe outside Soviet Union legalized abortion in cases of rape and threat to maternal health.[18] 1935 – Iceland became the first Western country to legalize therapeutic abortion under limited circumstances.[19] 1935 – Nazi Germany amended its eugenics law, to promote abortion for women who have hereditary disorders.[20] The law allowed abortion if a woman gave her permission, and if the fetus was not yet viable,[21][22][23] and for purposes of so-called racial hygiene.[24][25] 1936 – Joseph Stalin reversed most parts of Lenin's legalization of abortion in the Soviet Union to increase population growth.[26] 1936 – A US federal appeals court ruled in United States v. One Package of Japanese Pessaries that the federal government could not interfere with doctors providing contraception to their patients.[15] 1936 – The Government of Catalonia legalised free abortion during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. [27][28][29] 1936 – Heinrich Himmler, Chief of the SS, creates the "Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion". Himmler, inspired by bureaucrats of the Race and Settlement Main Office, hoped to reverse a decline in the "Aryan" birthrate which he attributed to homosexuality among men and abortions among healthy Aryan women,[30] which were not allowed under the 1935 law, but nevertheless practiced. Reich Secretary Martin Bormann however refused to implement law in this respect, which would revert the 1935 law. 1938 – In Britain, Dr. Aleck Bourne aborted the pregnancy of a young girl who had been raped by British soldiers. Bourne was acquitted after turning himself in to authorities. The legal precedent of allowing abortion in order to avoid mental or physical damage was picked up by other countries in the Commonwealth of Nations. 1938 – Abortion legalized on a limited basis in Sweden. 1948 – The Eugenic Protection Act in Japan expanded the circumstances in which abortion is allowed.[31] 1955 - Abortion legalized again in the Soviet Union.[26] 1959 – The American Law Institute (ALI) drafts a model state abortion law to make legal abortions accessible. 1964 - The first law to legalize abortion in Norway was passed in 1964. It allowed abortion in cases of danger to the mother, and the abortion decision was taken by two doctors. 1965 – The U.S. Supreme Court case Griswold v. Connecticut struck down one of the remaining Comstock laws, the state bans on contraception. 1966 – The Ceauşescu regime in Romania, in an attempt to boost the country's population, Decree 770 banned all abortion and contraception, except in very limited cases.[32] 1966 – Mississippi reformed its abortion law and became the first U.S. state to allow abortion in cases of rape. 1967 – The Abortion Act (effective 1968) legalized abortion in the United Kingdom under certain grounds (except in Northern Ireland). 1967 - In the U.S., California, Colorado, and North Carolina reformed their abortion laws based on the 1962 American Law Institute (ALI) Model Penal Code (MPC) 1968 – Georgia and Maryland reformed their abortion laws based on the ALI MPC. 1968– President Lyndon Johnson’s Committee on The Status of Women releases a report calling for a repeal of all abortion laws. 1969 – Arkansas, Delaware, Kansas, New Mexico and Oregon, reformed their abortion laws based on the ALI MPC. 1969– Canada passed the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1968-69, which began to allow abortion for selective reasons. 1969 – The ruling in the Victorian case of R v Davidson defined for the first time which abortions are lawful in Australia.[33]
Abortion in Nicaragua
In October 2006, right before the general elections on 5 November 2006, the National Assembly passed a bill further restricting abortion 52-0 (9 abstaining, 29 absent). The European Union and the United Nations had urged for the vote to be delayed until after the presidential elections. The new law outlawed abortion in all circumstances, making Nicaragua the sixth country in the world to do so, after Chile, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Malta, and Vatican City. The Assembly rejected a proposal which would have increased the penalty for performing an illegal abortion from 10 to 30 years in prison. President Enrique Bolaños supported this measure, but signed the bill into law on 17 November 2006. Pro-choice groups in Nicaragua have criticized the change to the country's abortion law, and one, the Women's Autonomous Movement, were prepared to file an injunction to prevent it from being enacted.