Shirley Wheeler was Jailed for Her Abortion in 1970 – Will it Happen Again?

Now that the Supreme Court has rescinded the constitutional right to a legal abortion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the story of Shirley Wheeler, who had an illegal abortion in Florida in 1970, is even more poignant. Wheeler’s story, which is featured in the new season of Slate’s Slow Burn podcast, took place nearly three years before Roe v. Wade legalized abortion at the federal level in 1973 — at a time when abortion’s legality was dictated by an uneven patchwork of different state laws.

Wheeler’s arrest, prosecution, conviction and sentencing over 50 years ago in a state with a restrictive abortion law is an important story to remember now that millions of women across America are again facing similar barriers.

When the 22-year-old Wheeler learned that she was pregnant in 1970, she was determined to avoid the fate she had suffered four years earlier. In 1966, she got pregnant after being raped by two youths. Without the means to obtain an abortion, she was forced to give birth to a son, whom she relinquished to relatives in North Carolina, her home state, to raise. When she became pregnant again in 1970 after moving to Florida, she sought an abortion — even though this time she was in a committed relationship with the father. As she later recalled, “I chose not to bring another child into this world that I couldn’t afford to take care of.”

At the time, Florida’s abortion statute — passed in 1866 — allowed the procedure only before “quickening,” a subjective standard relied upon in the 19th century to mark the first moment a pregnant woman felt fetal movement. Wheeler could not afford to travel to another state such as New York, which passed the nation’s most expansive abortion reform law in the spring of 1970, allowing legal abortion through the 24th week of pregnancy. Strapped for cash and initially unable to scrape together the $300 needed for an illegal abortion in Florida, Wheeler and her boyfriend could not take action until an income tax refund fortuitously came through. After her first visit to an illegal practitioner failed to terminate the pregnancy, a second attempt worked, although it caused her to hemorrhage and nearly killed her.

Shortly after Wheeler received emergency medical care at a hospital to stop the bleeding, police came to her home to arrest her. She spent several days in jail, where she was shown pictures of fetuses. She recalled the jailhouse doctor diagnosing her with vertigo, “and then he cussed me out.” Wheeler was indicted on a charge of aborting a “quick” fetus, although she maintained she had not felt fetal movement.

Wheeler’s case pointed out the disparities facing women who wanted to end a pregnancy.