The Moral Veto
The Moral Veto
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Why have legislative initiatives occurred on such controversial issues as contraception and abortion at times when activist movements had demobilized and the public seemed indifferent? Why have abortion and contraception sometimes been framed as matters of medical practice, and at other times as matters of moral significance? Based on archival and sociological research, and speaking to issues in the study of culture, social movements, and legal change, The Moral Veto examines what the history of controversies over morally charged issues tells us about cultural pluralism in the U.S.
- Relevant and accessible for undergraduate students in sociology, history, political science, women's studies, and public affairs
- In-depth understanding of the nature of state-level abortion laws in the years leading up to Roe v. Wade
- Places the sociology of culture and symbolic politics at the center of our understanding of social movements
- Provides an interpretation of the historical and political significance of Margaret Sanger, Mary Ware Dennett, and Catholic opposition to birth control
Reviews & endorsements
"...this is a book that can be read with profit by all serious students of its topics." --Keith Cassidy, The Journal of American History
"Contraceptive laws and abortion policy are subject to a 'moral veto' unless the framing on the issue is palatable to moderate-middle citizens. So argues Gene Burns in his examination of how, why, and when both contraceptive laws and abortion policies were reformed...by federal court decisions." -Laura R. Woliver, SIGNS
"Burns sheds new light on seemingly well-covered territory. Drawing on extensive archival research on the contraception and abortion debates, Burns convincingly illustrates that social movements can be their own biggest obstacles with it comes to concrete political success." Mobilization Deana A. Rohlinger, Florida State University
Product details
April 2005Hardback
9780521552097
354 pages
229 × 152 × 24 mm
0.69kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1. Framing contraception within moral worldviews: the early, radical birth control movement
- 2. The mainstreaming of birth control: a new alliance with eugenics and medicine
- 3. Dennett's moral worldview and the catholic moral veto: unsuccessful frames for contraception
- 4. Abortion before controversy: quiet reform within a medical, humanitarian frame
- 5. Abortion and legislative stalemate: the weakness and strength of the medical, humanitarian frame
- 6. Looking back: limiting frames, moral vetoes, and cultural Pluralism
- Notes
- Works cited.
