Working with St. Louis area Congresswoman Ann Wagner's mother-in-law, Puzder reasoned that if fetuses were recognized as having rights in other contexts, it would establish a foundation for challenging "Roe v. Wade" later on. It would also influence one section of Missouri House Bill 1596, an abortion law prohibiting the use of state money for abortions and declaring that life begins at conception. Following a challenge, the Supreme Court in 1989 upheld the law in "Webster v. Reproductive Health Services". The watershed decision opened the door for new state-level restrictions on abortion. Following the Webster decision in 1990, Puzder authored a commentary article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that "called on his colleagues and abortion-rights supporters to work together for new laws to help pregnant women and their children." BJ Isaacson Jones, the Director of Reproductive Health Services (the abortion clinic involved in the "Webster" case), contacted him and they began talking about areas where they could find common ground in an effort to help women and children.[13][14] Their common ground efforts grew into a national organization known as the Common Ground Network for Life and Choice with the objective of helping "activists get beyond their differences and, together, help pregnant women." The Network had an office in Washington DC and held two national conferences. In 1995, Puzder and Isaacson-Jones co-authored a pamphlet entitled "Adoption as Common Ground" and Isaacson Jones opened an adoption agency in the clinic. In July 1989, Puzder was appointed chair of the Task Force for Mothers and Unborn Children by Missouri Governor John Ashcroft. After "The Riverfront Times" published an article detailing allegations that he had abused his wife, he offered up his resignation to the Governor, which the Governor later rejected. His former wife subsequently "fully" withdrew those allegations in 1990 and has been adamant that Puzder was "not abusive" and that she would "most definitely confirm to anyone who may ask that in no way was there abuse." In a letter dated Jan. 18, 2017 that she sent to Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., and Sen. Patty Murray, she stated: "Let me be clear. Andy is not and was not abusive or violent. He is a good, loving, kind man and a deeply committed and loving father." She acknowledged that she was "misled by faulty advice of someone I trusted" and noted that "[t]he fact that my attorney used 'adult abuse' as a vehicle to gain leverage in our divorce proceedings has haunted me as well as our children to this day."