There was a time when right-leaning groups decried the proverbial “specter” of feminism. But now, 40 years after Gloria Steinem broke onto the feminist scene, an entirely different group of women are reclaiming the F word: “the pro-life feminists.” These women claim that the better-known feminists have perverted the term and, as a consequence, glorified abortion. Opponents of “pro-life feminism,” meanwhile, have equally harsh words for the movement – and its moniker.

“[Pro-life feminism] is a bit of an oxymoron,” says Ellen Malcolm, the IBM heiress who founded Emily’s List, a political machine designed to elect pro-choice female lawmakers. “To say that women should be able to make decisions about their own lives, except when it comes to their bodies — that seems contradictory to me.”

True, it’s hard for some people to comprehend the pro-life feminist camp, but that doesn’t make them any less real. In fact, many of its adherents claim the movement started far before the first woman burned her bra. It can be traced, they say, back to the legendary suffragette, Susan B. Anthony.

Two Steps Back, One Step Forward?

On July 8, 1869, a paper called The Revolution, which was founded by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Anthony, published an article entitled “Marriage and Maternity,” in which the author, known only as "A," describes abortion as “child murder.” The act is not simply a sin, it’s a symptom of the “noxious weed” that is patriarchal domination:

Women are educated to think that with marriage their individuality ceases or is transferred to their husbands. The wife has thenceforth no right over her own body. This is also the husband’s belief, and upon which he acts … It is clear to my mind that this evil wholly arises from the false position which woman occupies in civilized society.

Anthony had in fact spoken out against abortion – as exhibited in her oft-quoted speech, “Social Purity,” which equates abortion with infanticide – but Salon’s Tracy Clark-Flory points out that there’s no direct evidence to prove Anthony indeed wrote this piece. Regardless of the identity of "A," today’s pro-life feminists often invoke Anthony’s name in their crusade against abortion.

In 1992, former Heritage Foundation staff member Marjorie Dannenfelser founded a group called the Susan B. Anthony List as "an answer to Emily’s List." "It was very clear to me that if we wanted to have pro-life women in public office we were going to have to build a political machine to make that happen," explained Dannenfelser. While Dannenfelser’s group, which boasts a membership of 158,000, works mostly with Republicans – they gave $234,002 to 35 candidates during the last election cycle – the Susan B. Anthony List describes itself as nonpartisan and has in the past worked with a handful of Democrats, including late Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. Catherine Baker-Knoll. Though the group claims it’s working to “advance the role of pro-life women in the political process,” the List does at times help men who have opposed pro-choice women.

Some, of course, could argue that funding men over women undermines their female-centric mission, but Dannenfelser disagrees: “I believe that the life issue so undermines women … I couldn’t, in good conscience, support a woman that I thought was undermining the health, welfare and happiness of other women, because that is truly how I see it.” Ellen Malcolm, the founder of Emily’s List, sees their approach quite differently: “They want to keep progressive women out of Congress and elected office, and I think they have a very Republican Conservative agenda.”

While Dannenfelser, who grew up Episcopalian and points out that she was once pro-choice, insists she’s turned off by the violence inherent in abortion, another pro-life activist, Jenn Giroux, and her “Women Influencing the Nation” approach the argument with more piety.