The Fowler School of Law Health Law Society presents Professor Michele Goodwin and "Race, Bioethics & Abortion: Why Dr. King Was Right-Family Planning Is Essential For Women’s Liberation & Equality."  

Professor Goodwin’s talk pays homage to Dr. King, his broader legacy and pioneering work across health, economics, and women’s reproductive rights to underscore the profoundly relevant connection between economic equality and reproductive rights. As Goodwin emphasizes, Dr. King cared about not only racial equality but also equality for and among women. As her talk explains, King’s legacy includes a deep commitment to reproductive rights and justice as King recognized that family planning was “essential” and “necessary” in the advancement of civil rights. In this, Goodwin argues, King was stalwart and steadfast. Professor Goodwin’s talk emphasizes how King’s prescient statements on women’s equality through family planning resonate in the United States today with high rates of unintended pregnancies, infant mortality rates that rival developing countries, forced sterilization, and the curious uptick in criminal punishment of pregnant women.  Impediments to exercising reproductive autonomy ultimately force women into marginalized political and economic citizenship—historically and as a contemporary matter.