United States v. Vuitch is one of the first cases heard by the Supreme Court to deal with the constitutionality of a restricting law on medical abortions that would become a major precedent in the case of Roe v. Wade. Dr. Milan Vuitch was a Serbian immigrant and licensed physician in the United States who worked primarily in Washington, D.C. throughout the 1960s [4]. Under Washington, D.C. law, doctors such as Vuitch could provide legal abortions to women if their health or life were at risk according to their professional opinion [3]. The District of Columbia Code 22-201 stated that whomever procures, produces, or attempts to procure or produce an abortion of a woman will be imprisoned for up to 10 years unless the procedure was to preserve a woman’s life or health [2]. The definition of the word “health” was mostly up to the doctor’s interpretation, which would result in conflict in the case of Dr. Vuitch. The law did not protect doctors from the chance of getting into serious legal trouble if the necessity of a woman’s abortion was unclear at the time. Since the start of his practice in 1960, Vuitch was arrested 16 times and released [3]. With this said, in 1969, Milan Vuitch was convicted for the first time for performing an illegal abortion and sentenced to 1 year in prison [4]. This would lead to Vuitch challenging the law he was convicted under for being “unconstitutionally vague” [3]. Gerhard Gesell, the judge who heard Vuitch’s case at the district court, agreed with Vuitch’s claim that the law was unconstitutionally vague. He claimed that the word “health” was too uncertain and that the law violated the Fifth Amendment right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty [3]. With this said, Gesell dismissed the imputations against Vuitch. After Gesell’s decision, the United States government announced its plan to appeal the decision to the Supreme Court. The plan was followed through, and on April 21, 1971, Vuitch’s conviction was no longer overturned and the abortion law was back in place [6]. Though the Washington, D.C. law was reinstated, many historians claim that the abortion rights movement regarded this case as a victory in several respects [3]. This case set a precedent for allowing the term “health” to encompass both physical and mental well-being, as well as reaffirming that the burden of proof rested with the prosecution [2].
Looking into aspects of Dr. Milan Vuitch’s life from a sociocultural lens is important for fully understanding this case’s impact, the complex history and memory of medical abortion practices, and how his argument would later play into the abortion rights movement. Several newspaper publications, one of which was The Washington Post, emphasized that Vuitch was an immigrant from Serbia in an attempt to assert that his practice of providing abortions was related to his race and immigrant status [4]. Additionally, other articles described him as running an “abortion mill” that lacked consideration for women’s health, which Vuitch rejected [4]. The scrutiny that he faced throughout the years shows a combination of America’s issues besides abortion rights. Despite these continuous accusations, Vuitch was not one to hide his practice and looked for opportunities to share it to open up discussion about women’s reproductive rights. He wanted to explain the public contexts that motivated women to engage in his practice [4]. During an interview with Lawrence Lader, an early abortion rights movement leader, Vuitch claimed that “women cry for help and doctors just chase them away” [1]. What makes this case interesting is how open Vuitch’s defiance was to Code 22-201 in an attempt to create discussion and challenge common medical practice. In hindsight, District Judge Gesell, who claimed it is “imperative that uniform medical abortion services be provided for all segments of the population, the poor as well as the rich,” played an important role in furthering the discussion of women’s right to an abortion [5]. United States v. Vuitch is an impactful form of processual memory because of the lengthy legal processes of this case and how it shaped many of the ideals used when fighting against reproductive injustices. Additionally, this historical case is an example of material memory through the documentation, including newspaper articles written about Vuitch and many of his patients’ records used throughout the trial. The different dynamics of memory associated with this event add to its complexity while also revealing how broader sociocultural views of abortion have changed.
The impact of United States v. Vuitch rippled into the case of Roe v. Wade (1973). Both cases highlighted how abortion laws at the time were used to restrict women’s rights to abortion, which would spark discourse for years to come. Furthermore, the decision in United States v. Vuitch to reinstate the restrictive abortion law as well as Vuitch’s conviction fueled the fire to continue pushing for a woman’s constitutional right to have an abortion. The Vuitch case set a precedent for dissecting restrictive abortion laws while also establishing the debate of privacy rights in healthcare that would provide part of the legal framework for Roe v. Wade [4]. With this said, the discourse surrounding Vuitch established increasing support for the abortion rights movement.
Jacob Allred
Sources
[1] Barnes, Bart. “Milan M. Vuitch, 78, Dies; Challenged Abortion Laws: [FINAL Edition].” The Washington Post (April 10, 1993). http://libproxy.lib.unc.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/milan-m-vuitch-78-dies-challenged-abortion-laws/docview/307630392/se-2.
[2] Cornell Law. “United States, Appellant, v. Milan Vuitch.” Legal Information Institute. (January 12, 1971). https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/402/62.
[3] Higginbotham, Victoria. “United States v. Milan Vuitch (1971).” Embryo Project Encyclopedia (January 13, 2020). http://embryo.asu.edu/handle/10776/13142.
[4] Lowe, Nicholas. “Fighting Against All Odds: How Three Ethnically and Racially Diverse Abortion Providers Overcame Public Scrutiny to Challenge Society’s Outlook on the Controversial Abortion Laws.” Newcomb College Institute Research on Women, Gender, & Feminism (2014). https://journals.tulane.edu/NAJ/article/view/201.
[5] Moreno, Paul. “Roe v. Wade’s Opening Act, 50 years Later: The Supreme Court Handed Down its First Abortion Case, U.S. v. Vuitch, on April 21, 1971.” The American Spectator (April 21, 2021). https://spectator.org/roe-v-wade-us-vuitch-50-years-later/.
[6] “United States v. Vuitch.” Oyez. https://www.oyez.org/cases/1970/84.
I find it very interesting that the media brought up the fact that Dr. Vuitch was an immigrant. Different new outlets probably used this information to push a perspective that may or may not have been true in order to get people to side with them. This brings up the idea of narrativization in which those with the power write the story they want to be the truth, regardless of the bigger picture of the argument.
The background you give about the case is super interesting! I had no idea that abortions had ethnic discrimination tied to certain cases. The quotes you use are relevant and appeal to the audience, which make them want to keep reading. The paper is beautifully constructed and has a nice flow to it! My only thing is I wish the picture was properly hyperlinked. Overall great work!
I love how you highlight the discrepancy in the word “health” here. In the case of Vuitch and his subjectivity with the word specifically. My background as a health and exercise major makes this statement very interesting to me. Health has a very deep and different definition when you look at it in different times in history. For example, at a time it wasn’t considered unhealthy to smoke cigarettes. This makes law surrounding a subjective definition of health very controversial and I feel you highlighted that concept well in your article.