California's "Therapeutic Abortion Act"
A bipartisan majority in the California legislature supported a new law introduced by Democratic state senator Anthony Beilenson, the "Therapeutic Abortion Act". Catholic clergy were strongly opposed but Catholic lay people were divided and non-Catholics strongly supported the proposal. Governor Ronald Reagan consulted with his father-in-law, a prominent surgeon who supported the law. He also consulted with James Cardinal McIntyre, the Catholic archbishop of Los Angeles.
The archbishop strongly opposed any legalization of abortion and he convinced Reagan to announce he would veto the
proposed law since the draft allowed abortions in the case of birth defects. The legislature dropped that provision and Reagan signed the law, which decriminalized abortions when done to protect the health of the mother.[164][165][166]
Anthony Beilenson
The expectation was that abortions would not become more numerous but would become much safer under hospital conditions. In 1968 the first full year under the new law there were 5,018 abortions in California. The numbers grew exponentially and stabilized at about 100,000 annually by the 1970s. 99.2% of California women who applied for an abortion were granted one. One out of every three pregnancies was ended by illegal abortion.
The key factor was the sudden emergence of a woman's movement that introduced a very new idea—women had a basic right to control their bodies and could choose to have an abortion or not. Reagan by 1980 found his upport among anti-abortion religious groups and said he was too new as governor to make a wise decision.[167]
Ronald Reagan