The Silent Scream is an anti-abortion film released in 1984 by American Portrait Films, then based in Brunswick, Ohio. The film was created and narrated by Bernard Nathanson, an obstetrician and gynecologist from New York, and it was produced by Crusade for Life, an evangelical anti-abortion organization. In the video, Nathanson narrates ultrasound footage of an abortion of a twelve-week-old fetus, claiming that the fetus opened its mouth in what Nathanson calls a silent scream during the procedure. As a result of Nathanson's anti-abortion stance in the film, The Silent Scream contributed to the abortion debate in the 1980s.

In Maureen Kass v. Steven Kass (1998), the Court of Appeals of New York in Albany, New York, ruled that the state should generally consider IVF consent forms signed by participants in an in vitro fertilization (IVF) program valid, binding, and enforceable in the event of a dispute. The court indicated that decisions regarding the handling of cryopreserved pre-zygotes, often called preembryos, contained within these consent forms should be upheld. Although Steven and Maureen Kass had signed IVF consent forms agreeing to donate unused preembryos to research, during their divorce Maureen argued for custody of the preembryos. The New York Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Steven Kass and concluded that the informed consent forms signed by the former couple had clearly manifested the coupleÕs mutual intent to donate any preembryos to research in the event of a dispute.

In 2001, the Supreme Court of New Jersey decided a dispute between a divorced couple over cryopreserved preembryos created through in vitro fertilization (IVF) during the coupleÕs marriage. The former wife (J.B.) wanted the preembryos destroyed, while her former husband (M.B.) wanted them to be used for future implantation attempts, such as by an infertile couple. In J.B. v. M.B. (2001), the court declined to force J.B. to become a parent against her will, concluding that doing so would violate state public policy. Instead, the Supreme Court of New Jersey decided that agreements directing the allocation of cryopreserved preembryos will be enforced, unless one party changes his or her mind prior to the preembryosÕ use or destruction. Should a party revoke an earlier decision about the preembryos, New Jersey courts should weigh the partiesÕ interests with special weight given to an individualÕs right to not procreate.

In Davis v. Davis (1992), the Supreme Court of Tennessee decided a dispute over cryopreserved preembryos in favor of Junior Lewis Davis, who sought to have the preembryos destroyed over the objections of his former wife, Mary Sue Davis. The decision in Davis, although not binding in other states, suggested a framework for resolving similar disputes in the US. That framework established that courts should follow the wishes of those who contribute their sperm and egg cells, or gamete providers, to create preembryos. In the event of a dispute, courts should enforce any prior agreement between the gamete providers and in the absence of such an agreement, the court should weigh the interests of the parties, ordinarily ruling in favor of the party who wishes to avoid procreation.

Cocaine use by pregnant women has a variety of effects on the embryo and fetus, ranging from various gastro-intestinal and cardiac defects to tissue death from insufficient blood supply. Thus, cocaine has been termed a teratogen, or an agent that causes defects in fetuses during prenatal development. Cocaine is one of the most commonly used drugs in the US and it has a history of both medical and illegal recreational use. It is a drug capable of a wide array of effects on physical and mental health. Research on the teratogenic effects of cocaine began in the early 1980s, and in 1985 research on the effects of cocaine on prenatal development gained widespread attention. Since then, numerous studies have contributed to information about the detrimental impacts of maternal cocaine use on embryonic and fetal development.

In a dispute over the allocation of cryopreserved preembryos, the Supreme Court of Washington resolved the case of David J. Litowitz v. Becky M. Litowitz (2002) by reaching a decision that neither party wanted. David Litowitz sought to find adoptive parents for two cryopreserved preembryos created during his marriage to Becky Litowitz when the couple was attempting to have children using in vitro fertilization (IVF). Becky sought to implant the preembryos in a surrogate in an effort to parent a child. In June 2002, the court instead determined that the preembryos should have been destroyed. The court focused on the former couple s written consent agreement signed at the time of their participation in the IVF program, which stated that the preembryos would be destroyed after five years of storage.

In the case York v. Jones (1989), the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia was one of the first US courts to address a dispute over a cryopreserved preembryo. Steven York and Risa Adler-York (the Yorks), a married couple, provided their gametes to doctors who created the preembryo, which the court referred to as a pre-zygote, as part of an in vitro fertilization (IVF) program at the Howard and Georgeanna Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine (Jones Institute) in Norfolk, Virginia. The couple sued when the doctors at the Jones Institute refused to release the preembryo to the Yorks for use at a different IVF clinic. The Virginia district court denied the Jones Institute's attempt to have the York v. Jones case dismissed, and instead upheld the Yorks' right to move forward with their lawsuit. The York v. Jones decision had important implications for future disputes over cryopreserved preembryos because it treated the Yorks' cryopreserved preembryo as legal property over which the Yorks retained decision-making authority.

In Gonzales v. Carhart (2007), the US Supreme Court held in a five-to-four decision that the 2003 Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act passed by the US Congress was constitutional. Although the Court previously ruled in Stenberg v. Carhart (2000) that a Nebraska law that prohibited partial-birth abortions was unconstitutional, Gonzales reversed this decision. Gonzales created the precedent that anyone who delivers and kills a living fetus could be subject to legal consequences, unless he or she performed the procedure to save the life of the mother.

George Richard Tiller, a doctor who performed abortions in Wichita, Kansas, was shot to death on 31 May 2009 by Scott Roeder. As the director of one of only a small number of clinics in the US that performed legal late-term abortions, Tiller was a target for anti-abortion activists. Though Tiller lived and worked in Kansas, his work agitated anti-abortion groups and fueled the controversy surrounding abortion at a national level. Tiller's life and death fueled the abortion debate in the US.

In Stenberg v. Carhart, the US Supreme Court ruled on 28 June 2000 that a Nebraska law banning partial birth abortions was unconstitutional. Though the US Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade in 1973 had set a precedent that constitutionally protected abortions, some states established limitations on certain types of abortion procedures. When NebraskaÕs state government criminalized partial birth abortions, physician LeRoy Carhart challenged the constitutionality of the case. Don Stenberg, an Attorney General located in Lincoln, Nebraska, represented the state of Nebraska. Stenberg determined that states could not create undue burden on womenÕs right to terminate their pregnancies, and that specific restrictions on abortion procedures must include an exception to protect a womanÕs health and life.