Welcome to this episode of the award-winning Best of Left podcast.

When when its value is seen only in relation to their ability to bear and raise children,

you get policies that strip them of the right to choose

whether or not that's something they actually want for themselves and the lived

consequences are devastating. Sources providing our top takes in about 50 minutes today includes the

readout, Now This Impact, Daniel Moody, Democracy Now, Brittany Page and the Defenders.

Then in the additional deeper dives half of the show, there will be more in five sections.

Section A, the Casualties.

Section B, Religion, Section C, the punishment is the point, section D, black women, and section E, the pushback. You may not be familiar with a term called Coverture, but stick with me for a moment

because I'm going to explain.

Coverture was the law of the land in Europe and in America for the first three and a half centuries

from colonization through the creation of the United States.

And it's the reason women in the 1800s and before,

and we're talking white women here, not enslaved black women,

had essentially no rights over their money, land, or even their own bodies.

Under coverture, married women were considered the property of their husbands,

which meant they could not seek gainful employment or manage their assets

independently. It wasn't until the women's rights movement in the mid-1800s

that women began property act in

the passage of the Married Women's Property Act in Mississippi in 1839

triggered a wave of similar legislation

across the country that allowed women to regain ownership

...