History
Defending Life Since 1971
Americans United for Life (AUL) is the country’s oldest national pro-life organization, incorporated in August, 1971 in Washington, D.C. AUL was founded by a group of activists, including Brent Bozell of National Review, who wanted to educate Americans about abortion from a non-denominational, interdisciplinary perspective. Early board members included Catholics, Unitarians and Jews.
The first chairman of the AUL Board was George Huntson Williams, a Unitarian minister who then held the Hollis Professor of Divinity Chair at Harvard Divinity School.
1971: At a time when several states are moving to legalize abortion, AUL is established in Washington, D.C. as the first national pro-life organization, with the goal of educating American citizenry to counter the growing threat of disrespect for human life.
1972: AUL sponsors the research and publication of the landmark book Abortion and Social Justice by Thomas W. Hilgers.
1973: The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade legalizes abortion through all nine months of pregnancy. AUL (which had filed amicus briefs in the case from such pro-life legal experts such as Notre Dame law professor Charles Rice), now begins raising funds to enter the field of public-interest law.
1975: AUL files briefs in pivotal Supreme Court case Poelker v. Doe, which establishes that public hospitals need not perform abortions. In other activities reflecting the organization’s new focus on public-interest law, AUL legal expert Dennis Horan publishes an article in Baylor Law Review on “Euthanasia, Medical Treatment and the Mongoloid Child,” and AUL Director David Louisell serves on the National Commission on the Protection of Human Subjects. This year AUL also moves its headquarters to Chicago.
1978: AUL cosponsors a national conference on “The Psychological Aspects of Abortion“ and begins training the next generation of pro-life lawyers with its David Louisell Intern summer program for law students.
1979: AUL represents U.S. Senators Buckley and Helms as intervening defendants in their landmark Hyde Amendment litigation in New York and Chicago federal court, to establish that states do not have to fund abortion.
1980: AUL Vice Chairman, Victor Rosenblum, successfully defends Hyde Amendment at the U.S. Supreme Court in Harris v. McRae, resolving a four-year legal battle to prevent the use of taxpayer money to fund abortion. AUL also files a brief in the U.S. Supreme Court case H.L. v. Matheson (upholding parental notification requirements for abortion), and coordinates the publication of Death, Dying and Euthanasia by David Mall and Dennis J. Horan.
1981: AUL sponsors publication of New Perspectives on Human Abortion by Thomas W. Hilgers, Dennis J. Horan, and David Mall.
1981-1985: AUL is involved in a series of landmark medical treatment cases in New York, Massachusetts, and New Jersey involving withdrawal of food and fluids.
1982: AUL publishes Infanticide and the Handicapped Newborn (based on AUL’s 1980 international infanticide conference) through Brigham Young University Press. The organization also files briefs in three key U.S. Supreme Court cases: Planned Parenthood v. Ashcroft, City of Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, and Simopoulos v. Virginia (decided in 1983, approving significant state regulations on abortion).
1984: AUL sponsors national conference on “Reversing Roe.”
1987: Abortion and the Constitution: Reversing Roe v. Wade Through the Courts, edited by AUL staff, is published by Georgetown University Press.
1988-1989: AUL organizes briefing program in U.S. Supreme Court Webster decision, which cuts back on Roe v. Wade, sanctioning prohibitions on the use of state facilities and personnel for abortion and viability determinations.
1989: AUL sponsors first Legislators Educational Conference to educate state legislators nationwide on pro-life public policy.
1990: AUL sponsors Gallup Poll on abortion, the most comprehensive survey ever of American attitudes toward abortion.
1991: AUL quantitative research analyst, James Rogers, Ph.D., publishes article in prestigious American Journal of Public Health, revealing the positive impact of Minnesota’s parental-notice law on teenage pregnancy and abortion rates.
1992: AUL’s work in Planned Parenthood v. Casey is instrumental in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to cut back on Roe v. Wade and approve state informed-consent laws for the first time. AUL resident scholar Marvin Olasky, Ph.D., publishes Abortion Rites: A Social History of Abortion in America.
1993: AUL publishes first the comprehensive legal critique of the Casey decision.
1993-1995: AUL works with more than one-third of state attorneys general nationwide on pro-life litigation.
1994: AUL launches 15-year, post-Casey plan to alter the public-policy landscape of life issues in America, culminating with a human life amendment to U.S. Constitution. The organization also leads a briefing strategy in three state and federal cases to defeat attempts to establish a constitutional “right” to assisted suicide.
1995: In the wake of pro-life victories in the 1994 elections, AUL provides legislative counsel and support to 43 states and Puerto Rico. AUL also works to prevent the FDA from approving the abortion pill RU-486 by filing a Citizen Petition on behalf of Members of Congress. Its petition details the documented dangers of RU-486 to women and their subsequent live children
1995-1996: AUL works to include information on abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link in state laws covering informed consent for abortion, and publishes several editorials on ABC connection in national magazines and newspapers.
1997-2000: AUL works with more than two-thirds of state attorneys general nationwide on state partial-birth abortion litigation.
2000: AUL organizes briefing strategy and files brief in U.S. Supreme Court case Stenberg v. Carhart, in which the court narrowly strikes down 30 states’ ban on partial-birth abortion.
2000-2001: AUL represents the state defendant in a constitutional challenge to Arizona abortion clinic regulations enacted in 1999 following a highly publicized abortion-related death of a 32-year-old mother at the hands of an abortionist who was later criminally convicted. The organization also works with several legislatures and attorneys general in this developing area of law.
2001: AUL leads nationwide effort in state legislation for health care rights of conscience to protect pro-life doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and medical students from employment discrimination. The organization also develops model legislation for states to ban human cloning and destructive human embryo research.
2002: AUL continues to spearhead international efforts to protect the rights of conscience of pro-life medical professionals against the encroachments of abortion advocates. It also leads the legal defense of abortion clinic regulations in Arizona and helps develop a legal strategy for giving states the option of using federal money to fund abortion alternatives.
2003: The first-ever “AUL State Report Cards” are compiled. Released in early 2004, they rate each state in terms of its safety–or danger–for pregnant mothers and their unborn children. AUL Vice President of Legal Affairs, Denise Burke, leads the legal defense of abortion clinic regulations in Arizona, successfully countering the abortion lobby’s efforts to reframe and reinvigorate the abortion right on “equal protection” grounds. Ms. Burke argued the appeal of this case before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco and effectively blunted attempts by abortion industry attorneys to argue that the abortion right was protected under the Equal Protection clause of the 14th Amendment and thus state attempts to regulate the practice were invalid.
2006: The first edition of Defending Life: Proven Strategies for a Pro-Life America, AUL’s acclaimed state-by-state legal guide to abortion, bioethics, and end-of-life issues is published.
2007: AUL State Supreme Court Project white papers are published online at AULStateSupremeCourtProject.org.
2008: Dr. Charmaine Yoest is appointed AUL President & CEO. AUL launches its Fight FOCA campaign to combat incoming President Obama’s promise to sign a radical pro-abortion bill that would dramatically expand abortion in the United States by removing any regulations of abortion and expanding the types of people who can perform them.
AUL enters the international stage as its attorneys file a brief supporting a lawsuit before the Mexico Supreme Court, contesting a 2007 Mexico City law allowing abortions in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. The brief argues that abortion poses drastic short- and long-term health risks for women. It focuses on both the physical and psychological health risks, demonstrating that abortion harms women and should remain illegal.
2009: AUL President & CEO Dr. Charmaine Yoest leads the charge in opposition to Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor, providing key testimony before a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing.
Immediately following the Sotomayor hearings, AUL launches a national grassroots campaign - Real Health Care Respects Life – to fight pro-abortion health care. Dr. Yoest meets with White House officials and engages key pro-life Democrats throughout the health care debate. AUL emerges as a leading voice in opposition to pro-abortion health care.
On the state legislative front, pro-life bills based on AUL’s models are introduced in numerous states. AUL’s new “Pregnant Woman’s Protection Act” is passed unanimously by the Oklahoma legislature and signed into law.
AUL files its own brief and coordinates the legal briefing among groups seeking to prevent the Montana Supreme Court from recognizing a state-based right to assisted suicide in Baxter v. Montana. When the decision leaves open the possibility of such a right, AUL works with Montana groups to try to block it.
Internationally, Sr. Vice president William Saunders serves as consultant in the case of ABC v. Ireland before the European Court of Human Rights, a case which has the potential to be “the Roe v. Wade of Europe”.
2010: AUL Action launches the first-ever Virtual March for Life to engage pro-life Americans across the nation. This hugely successful online effort draws nearly 85,000 in a week’s time including Gov. Sarah Palin, Gov. Mike Huckabee, Gov. Mitt Romney, Gov. Tim Pawlenty, House Minority Leader John Boehner, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and many others on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade. This online effort and AUL’s subsequent “Life Counts” campaign use all methods – from the very modern to the most tried and true – to galvanize opposition to President Obama’s pro-abortion health care bill.
As soon as health care reform is enacted, AUL responds by immediately drafting model legislation permitting states to opt out of providing health-care plans (through the mandated state Exchanges) that cover abortion. In one week’s time, the organization receives 300 requests for this model, with requests coming from all 50 states.
AUL launches Advocates for Life, a network of pro-life student groups in the nation’s law schools. Chapters are established at Harvard, Columbia, Georgetown, George Mason, Notre Dame, Fordham. Boston College, and St. Thomas.
