Planned Parenthood
The Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc., or simply Planned Parenthood, is an American nonprofit organization that provides reproductive and sexual healthcare and sexual education in the United States and globally. It is a member of the International Planned Parenthood Federation.
PPFA has its roots in Brooklyn, New York, where Margaret Sanger opened the first birth control clinic in the United States, in 1916. Sanger founded the American Birth Control League in 1921, and 14 years after her exit as its president, ABCL's successor organization became Planned Parenthood in 1942.
Planned Parenthood consists of 159 medical and non-medical affiliates, which operate over 600 health clinics in the United States. It partners with organizations in 12 countries globally. The organization directly provides a variety of reproductive health services and sexual education, contributes to research in reproductive technology and advocates for the protection and expansion of reproductive rights. Research shows that closures of Planned Parenthood clinics lead to increases in maternal mortality rates.
PPFA is the largest single provider of reproductive health services and the largest single provider of abortions in the United States. In its 2023 Annual Report, PPFA reported seeing over two million patients and performing a total of 9.13 million discrete services including 392,715 abortions. Its combined annual revenue is billion, including approximately million in government funding such as Medicaid reimbursements. Throughout its history, PPFA and its member clinics have been the subject of support, criticism, controversy, protests, and violent attacks.
History
Origins
The origins of Planned Parenthood date to October 16, 1916, when Margaret Sanger, her sister Ethel Byrne, and Fania Mindell opened the first birth control clinic in the U.S. in the Brownsville section of the New York borough of Brooklyn. They distributed birth control, birth control advice, and birth control information. All three women were arrested and jailed for violating provisions of the Comstock Act, accused of distributing obscene materials at the clinic. The so-called Brownsville trials brought national attention and support to their cause. Sanger and her co-defendants were convicted on misdemeanor charges, which they appealed through two subsequent appeals courts. While the convictions were not overturned, the judge who issued the final ruling also modified the law to permit physician-prescribed birth control. The women's campaign led to major changes in the laws governing birth control and sex education in the United States.In 1921, the clinic was organized into the American Birth Control League, the core of the only national birth-control organization in the U.S. until the 1960s. By 1941, it was operating 222 centers and had served 49,000 clients. In 1923, Sanger opened the Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau for dispensing contraceptives under the supervision of licensed physicians and studying their effectiveness.
Some found the ABCL's title offensive and "against families", so the League began discussions for a new name. In 1938, a group of private citizens organized the Citizens Committee for Planned Parenthood to aid the American Birth Control League in spreading scientific knowledge about birth control to the general public. The BCCRB merged with the ABCL in 1939 to form the Birth Control Federation of America. In 1942 the name of the BCFA was changed to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
1940s–1960s
Under the leadership of National Director D. Kenneth Rose, the PPFA expanded its programs and services through the 1940s, adding affiliate organizations throughout the country. By the end of World War II, the Federation was no longer solely a center for birth control services or a clearing house for contraceptive information but had emerged as a major national health organization. PPFA's programs included a full range of family planning services including marriage education and counseling, and infertility services. The leadership of the PPFA, largely consisting of businessmen and male physicians, endeavored to incorporate its contraceptive services unofficially into regional and national public health programs by emphasizing less politicized aspects such as child spacing.During the 1950s, the Federation further adjusted its programs and message to appeal to a family-centered, more conservative post-war populace, while continuing to function, through its affiliated clinics, as the more reliable source of contraceptives in the country.
From 1942 to 1962, PPFA concentrated its efforts on strengthening its ties to affiliates, expanding public education programs, and improving its medical and research work. By 1960, visitors to PPFA centers across the nation numbered over 300,000 per year.
Largely relying on a volunteer workforce, by 1960 the Federation had provided family planning counseling in hundreds of communities across the country. Planned Parenthood was one of the founding members of the International Planned Parenthood Federation when it was launched at a conference in Bombay, India, in 1952.
In 1961, the population crisis debate, along with funding shortages, convinced PPFA to merge with the World Population Emergency Campaign, a citizens' fund-raising organization to become PPFA-World Population.
Both Planned Parenthood and Margaret Sanger are strongly associated with the abortion issue today. For much of the organization's history, however, and throughout Sanger's life, abortion was illegal in the U.S., and discussions of the issue were often censored. During this period, Sanger – like other American advocates of birth control – publicly condemned abortion, arguing that it would not be needed if every woman had access to birth control.
1960s–present
Following Margaret Sanger, Alan Frank Guttmacher became president of Planned Parenthood, serving from 1962 until 1974. During his tenure, the Food and Drug Administration approved the sale of the original birth control pill, giving rise to new attitudes towards women's reproductive freedom. Also during his presidency, Planned Parenthood lobbied the federal government to support reproductive health, culminating with President Richard Nixon's signing of Title X to provide government subsidies for low-income women to access family planning services. The Center for Family Planning Program Development was also founded as a semi-autonomous division during this time. The center became an independent organization and was renamed the Guttmacher Institute in 1977.Planned Parenthood began to advocate abortion law reform beginning in 1955, when the organization's medical director, Mary Calderone, convened a national conference of medical professionals on the issue. The conference was the first instance of physicians and other professionals advocating reform of the laws which criminalized abortion, and it played a key role in creating a movement for the reform of abortion laws in the U.S. Focusing, at first, on legalizing therapeutic abortion, Planned Parenthood became an increasingly vocal proponent of liberalized abortion laws during the 1960s, culminating in its call for the repeal of all anti-abortion laws in 1969. In the years that followed, the organization played a key role in landmark abortion rights cases such as Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Once abortion was legalized during the early 1970s, Planned Parenthood also began acting as an abortion provider.
Faye Wattleton became the first African American president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America in 1978. Wattleton, who was also the youngest president in Planned Parenthood's history, served in this role until 1992. During her term, Planned Parenthood grew to become the seventh largest charity in the country, providing services to four million clients each year through its 170 affiliates, whose activities were spread across 50 states.
From 1996 to 2006, Planned Parenthood was led by Gloria Feldt. Feldt activated the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, the organization's political action committee, launching what was the most far-reaching electoral advocacy effort in its history. The PPAF serves as the nonpartisan political advocacy arm of PPFA. It engages in educational and electoral activity, including legislative advocacy, voter education, and grassroots organizing to promote the PPFA mission. Feldt also launched the Responsible Choices Action Agenda, a nationwide campaign to increase services to prevent unwanted pregnancies, improve the quality of reproductive care, and ensure access to safe and legal abortions. Another initiative was the commencement of a "Global Partnership Program", to build a vibrant activist constituency in support of family planning.
On February 15, 2006, Cecile Richards, the daughter of former Texas governor Ann Richards, and formerly the deputy chief of staff to the U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, became president of the organization. In 2012, Richards was voted one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People in the World.
Richards' tenure as president of the organization ended on April 30, 2018. Current Planned Parenthood board member Joe Solmonese was appointed as transition chair to temporarily oversee the day-to-day operations of Planned Parenthood after Richards' departure.
On September 12, 2018, the organization announced that Leana Wen would take over as president, effective November 2018. Wen was removed as president of Planned Parenthood by the organization's board of directors on July 16, 2019. Alexis McGill Johnson, a board member and former chairwoman, became the organization's acting president.