The Clinica Para Madres (Mother’s Clinic) opened in Tucson, Arizona, in December of 1934 as the first birth control clinic in Arizona. After moving to Tucson, birth control activist Margaret Sanger, along with a group of local philanthropic women, founded the clinic to provide Arizona women with contraception. During the early 1900s in the US, contraception was illegal under the federal Comstock Act. Additionally, many viewed contraception and sex as obscene and not to be discussed in public or outside of marriage. In 1950 the clinic affiliated with the national organization, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and it eventually became the Planned Parenthood of Southern Arizona. Clinica Para Madres, the first birth control clinic in Arizona, provided women with contraception despite birth control being illegal and socially stigmatized.

Established in 1950, the Planned Parenthood Center of Tucson provided Arizona women with family planning resources until 1977, when it expanded to locations outside of Tucson and became Planned Parenthood of Southern Arizona. The Planned Parenthood Center of Tucson was formed after the Clinica Para Madres, the first birth control clinic in Arizona, merged with the national organization Planned Parenthood Federation of America. The clinic moved to several rented locations throughout the Tucson area before establishing a permanent location named the Margaret Sanger Clinic in Tucson, Arizona.

Forbes v. Napolitano (2000) was a US court case that established that Arizona researchers could use fetal tissues from induced abortions for basic scientific research, for instance, as a source of stem cells. The case challenged the constitutionality of the Arizona Revised Statute (ARS) 36-2303 in the Ninth Circuit US Court of Appeals, a law that banned researchers from using fetal tissues from abortions for any type of medical experimentation or investigation. The Ninth Circuit US Court of Appeals decision in Forbes v. Napolitano set a precedent in Arizona that allowed researchers and physicians to use tissues from aborted fetuses for medical research and treatments. Arizona later passed a state law in 2016 that sought to make obsolete the decision reached in Forbes v. Napolitano by revising ARS 36-2303 to avoid the problems the court had found with it.

The Planned Parenthood Committee of Phoenix was established in 1942 to expand Arizona women's access to family planning resources. The Planned Parenthood Committee of Phoenix was formed through the merging of The Mother's Health Clinic in Phoenix, Arizona, with the national Planned Parenthood Federation of America. The clinic was primarily based within the Phoenix Memorial Hospital campus but expanded to other locations in the late 1960s. Until it became Planned Parenthood of Central and Northern Arizona in 1978, the Planned Parenthood Committee of Phoenix provided Arizona women with contraception, initially in the form of diaphragms and spermicide, and later including the birth control pill. It also provided educational information on relationships, sex, contraception, and infertility.

In the 1989 case Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, the US Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of a Missouri law regulating abortion care. The Missouri law prohibited the use of public facilities, employees, or funds to provide abortion counseling or services. The law also placed restrictions on physicians who provided abortions. A group of physicians affected by the law challenged the constitutionality of certain sections of it. The US federal district court that first heard the case ruled many of the challenged sections of the law unconstitutional. The Missouri attorney general then appealed the case to an US federal appeals court and eventually to the US Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. In a five to four decision, the US Supreme Court overturned the decisions of the lower federal courts, ruling that it was constitutional to prohibit public funds, facilities, and employees from providing abortion care. In doing so, the Supreme Court upheld a state law that limited women’s access to abortions and established a precedent that states could apply restrictions to abortion care.

In the 2016 case Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, the US Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional the Texas requirements that abortion providers have admitting privileges at local hospitals and that abortion facilities meet ambulatory surgical center standards. Whole Woman’s Health represented abortion care providers in Texas and brought the case against the commissioner for the Texas Department of State Health Services, John Hellerstedt. In a five to three decision, the US Supreme Court ruled that the requirements of the challenged law, Texas House Bill 2, had forced the majority of abortion care facilities to close. With fewer available facilities, women faced undue burdens of travel time and cost when seeking abortions, restricting their access abortion care. In previous US Supreme Court cases Roe v. Wade (1973) and Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), the Court ruled that placing undue burdens on women seeking abortion care was unconstitutional. Upholding those decisions in Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, the US Supreme Court struck down Texas House Bill 2 and protected women’s access to abortion care.