We know abortions occurred before Roe v. Wade. What we don’t know is how many more lives have been extinguished since Roe v. Wade made abortion an alleged “right” and put the imprimatur of our Constitution on the practice. But I doubt your claim that because the birth rate remained relatively consistent that it necessarily follows that the abortion rate did too.
One can draw the logical inference that it was, especially since most OB/GYNs at the time admitted they were performing illegal abortions and writing down something else on the charts.
You see, the thing was, the Court probably didn't think it was doing anything controversial in 1973. They were striking down laws that no one was obeying.
I'll give you a better example. We all know that prostitution is illegal in 49 states. Yet there are an estimated 3 million sex workers employed by massage parlors, escort services, strip clubs, or just working on line.
Sessions shut down Backpage but new websites have popped up to replace it.
So do you really think abortion was that hard to find in 1973. Of course it wasn't.
So how did we go from "Getting rid of a law that no one was obeying" to "Oh, my God, this is an important political issue!"
Well, we can thank the rise of the religious right. In 1976, three years after Roe, the GOP had a neutral position on Roe in their platform. Top Republicans like Geo. H. Bush supported abortion rights. But then the Evangelicals needed an issue to put asses back in pews. Before that, they didn't care about politics that much, and saw Abortion as a "Catholic" thing.
And this is where the GOP has pulled a fast one on you... Originally, the 7-2 majority on Roe consisted of 5 Republicans voting yes, and 1 voting no. Of the Republican appointees to the courts since Roe before the Orange Shitgibbon, more of them supported preserving Roe (Steven, O'Connor, Kennedy, Souter, Roberts) than overturning it (Scalia, Uncle Thomas, Alito).
The only reason we are here is Trump (who has probably paid for abortions himself), was too stupid to realize you need to maintain a balance and pandered to his radical base.