Conference turris::womannotes-v3

    Hi all. I have some questions regarding abortion. So far in my life I
    have been prolife. Nonviolently prolife. I want to support women's
    rights to do with as they please with their bodies, but I have
    difficulty separating that from fetal rights. I have heard all the
    arguments both ways and always want to fight very hard for prochoice
    and then, and this is strictly and very personal with me, I think of
    little children that will never be born. This isn't a "what if that
    child would have been another Einstein" argument. THis is just little
    children or babies and how I feel about them. I have heard the
    arguments for not being able to give the kid even the basic living
    requirements and I still don't care. I understand them all. I'm just
    removed from them.
    
    What I would like to hear from the Pro choice people is how they made
    their decisions and how they reconciled them with their own upbringing.
    
    If the moderators want to move this to it's own topic, feel free.
    
                                Phil

    Phil -
    
    I strongly encourage you to go back to V2 and read the two strings
    there on 'Making the Abortion Decision'.  They cover exactly what
    you have asked for, and are around note numbers 325 or so.
    
    Alison

    Other discussions on abortion, each of which contain information to
    some degree on how people feel or think about abortion, include:
    
    Womannotes-v1
    644 - an uglier side of abortion
    733 - safer abortions, but not for you
    
    Womannotes-v2
    183 - abortion concerns
    187 - abortion decisions
    392 and 393 - FWO/FGD parallel strings on "making a decision about
    		  abortion"
    
    Mennotes
    261 - Fathers rights in abortions
    415 - men on abortion
    
    
    -Jody
    

    Thank you. I'll certainly look at 187 in v2 and 415 in mennotes. I
    wasn't looking to see why anyone chose to have one or support a woman
    who was having an abortion. I was just curious as to why a person chose
    prochoice over prolife and maybe help me make my own decision. I guess
    I'm waffaling right now, though I have been prolife in the past.
    
    Hmmm this may take a while. At two hours a day in NOTES after work
    hours, I should be back in 1995. hehe 

    
    re:.1
    i, personally, appreciate your delicacy in broaching this topic
    since, while i obviously don't really know what goes through a 
    woman's mind, i do know that of all the women i've ever known or 
    known of that have had an abortion, not a one took the decision 
    lightly. 
    

    I agree.  The prevailing image, though, is one of a woman deciding to
    abort because she's got a date that weekend or something.  Many people
    think women are too frivolous and silly to be entrusted with this
    particular part of their ability to continue the chain of life.  We're
    considered wise enough to raise children, but not wise enough to make
    decisions about our own lives.  I've never known any woman who took her
    reproductive powers lightly.  From the first bloodstain, it's serious
    business.  The light, casual, flippant attitudes about sex and
    reproduction seem to come more from the male side of the camp.

    R .5 & .6 Thank you. I am trying to be sensitive, as I realize that it
    can be the most important decision a woman will ever have to make.
    
    What I am trying to get at is, what made you come down on the side of
    prochoice as opposed to prolife. This is whether you have had an
    abortion or not. I am interested in hearing from the men also. I think
    and would hope that at least 99.9...% of the men in here support women
    and I would like my own support of all women to extend to prochoice.
    The prolifers are getting a bit to militant for me and I have always
    had a problem with the religious argument. I just want to review my own
    feelings and was hoping some input from the other side would help.
    
    Oh yeah. I am reading the various topics in V2 and while they are
    insightful, the mostly seem to revolve around a decisiont to have or
    not to have an abortion and this isn't really what I'm seeking.
    Although, I would suspect that that might play a big role in your
    feelings also. Whew, this is long winded for me.
    
    
                            Thanks,
    
                            Phil

OK, I didn't understand the question the first time around.  So why am I,
personally, pro-choice?

Short answer.  I don't believe the government has a place dictating what 
are essentially private decisions.  Whether or not to have children should
be a private decision.  And I, as a member of the body politic, don't
want to dictate to others whether they may be sexually active, or whether
they should have children.

Longer answer.  I believe that it is necessary to separate the *morality* 
of abortion from its *legality*.  I think the pro-choice stand allows for 
that distinction, while the pro-life position appears not to.  I have 
little quarrel with those who find abortion immoral.  I think they have a 
right (and possibly a duty) to encourage women who find themselves with a 
problem pregnancy to continue it, and to provide help to those women both 
before and after the birth.  And no woman who feels abortion is immoral 
should feel coerced into having one.  However, for those women who find 
abortion the moral route, having the procedure be legal enables it to be 
physically safe.  That also has value.

Hope this helps.

Alison
  

    
    re:.8
    PERFECT!
    

    I also agree with what Alison said.  What follows are the thoughts 
    and feelings I've had about pregnancy.  It rambles a bit, it's all
    personal experience, but (Phil) I think it gets around to what you
    asked for.  You said:

    > I have heard all the arguments both ways and always want to fight 
    > very hard for prochoice and then, and this is strictly and very 
    > personal with me, I think of little children that will never be 
    > born . . . THis is just little children or babies and how I feel 
    > about them. 

    I'm not sure I've ever had to decide because I think I've always been
    prochoice, but what I've written is (eventually) about little children 
    and babies and how I feel about them.

    I grew up when abortion was illegal, and I remember hearing about 
    women who had "back alley" abortions.  I grew up terribly afraid I
    would get pregnant; I think at the time it was illegal, also, to buy
    contraceptives.  If not illegal, it wasn't easy.  I remember sitting
    in my boyfriend's car while he went into the pharmacy for foam and 
    condoms.  When he came out, the pharmacist would usually follow him 
    out of the store and stand outside, scowling, and watch him cross 
    the street to the car.  He'd stand there and look at us until we 
    drove away.  I was really relieved when abortion became legal, "just
    in case".
    
    I like babies a lot.  I babysat as a young teenager to earn money.
    My older sister married and had children young, so I was an aunt at 
    a young age.  My best friend got pregnant when she was 14 and this 
    scared me into prudery for a few years.  She went away to a "home" 
    to have her baby and when she came out of the home she kept him.  At
    first she lived with her parents but then she moved out on her own 
    with the help of AFDC and we gradually fell out of touch as our 
    lives went in different directions.  

    About 10 years ago I went with my oldest sister to meet her new (to 
    be adopted) daughter at the airport.  Cate was 9 months old and very
    distraught when she was carried off the plane.  I was the only one 
    she would settle down with for the first 18 hours or so of that 
    first day, so I held her till my arms ached, I bounced her, and 
    chortled in her ear, and sometimes she'd rest from her crying and 
    put her red, puffy little face on my shoulder and let me stroke her 
    head till she fell asleep.  I've had many tender moments with 
    babies. 
    
    I don't think I have ever thought of an embryo as a baby, not even
    once. 
    
    I got pregnant.  I was (young and) foolish and irresponsible and  
    I'm pretty sure (it was a long time ago) we used no birth control.
    I don't recall ever talking about birth control, I think he just 
    assumed I was taking the pill and I never said I wasn't.  We were
    temporarily in the same place at the same time and we "went 
    together" for a month or two.  I never told him I was pregnant.
    I considered keeping the baby and tried to figure out what I'd do 
    after I had it.  I thought about giving birth and then giving the 
    baby up for adoption.  I decided to have an abortion.  I wondered 
    about how I would feel afterwards.  I didn't know beforehand, how 
    I would feel later.
    
    About 3 or 4 years ago I was at a summer lawn party.  Many of the
    guests were parents and many brought their children.  I noticed a 
    little girl of about 5.  She played quietly with some of the 
    children and occasionally talked to the adults.  She had a 
    thoughtful expression.  She was slim, her legs were strong and 
    straight and she could run.  She was dressed in a cool white summer 
    dress, not too ruffly, maybe a pinafore style, and her dark, 
    straight hair was cut in a page boy style.  I watched that little 
    girl and thought maybe, if I'd let my pregnancy continue, I would've
    had a child like that one.  I thought about how my life would've 
    been different and wondered whether I would've been a good mother.
    
    In my mind (my heart, my gut) an embryo has always and only been a
    potential baby (child, adult).  My "babies" were made of my dreams, 
    of my emotions; they lived in my mind (my heart).  There have been 
    times when I've wanted to be pregnant, and during these times it was
    "painful" to use birth control.  (Painful is in quotes because I'm
    not sure that's the right word; I was conflicted.)  Without the 
    dream baby, my physical condition meant nothing.  Somehow, these two 
    (dream baby and embryo) are (and always have been) separate.  I'm
    positive that I wouldn't be able to separate the two at a later
    stage of pregnancy; the fetus would at some point make itself known 
    to me as a baby, even if there was no dream baby.  I don't know when 
    this later stage would occur for me, but if not when I "started to 
    show", then definitely when I felt the first stirrings.

    CQ

    Whew! Thank you all. You've given me lots of food for thought.
    Christine, thank you very much for sharing with us all, what must have
    been some very painful experiences and very hard decisions to make.
    Yes, painful is an extremely correct word to use here. I know the pain
    of wondering what a potential child would have been like. My ex-wife
    had 2 abortions and neglected to inform me of them. I found out when I
    got the bill. Even though I can't be sure of who the father was on one
    of them and can unequivically guarantee that the 2nd one wasn't mine,
    we were no longer sleeping together at the time, I still wonder about
    them. That might be why I am pro-life.
    
    I have been finding the pro-lifers to militant for my tastes lately. I
    think their cause is just but their actions border on the obscene to
    me. Not all of them of course, probably not even many. I just haven't
    heard very much condemnation of the more vocal factions. I may be
    getting slanted news reports. Lord knows the media has been more than
    biased in the past on other issues. I have never heard of prochoicers
    violently forcing their ideas on other people. Reasoned logic and
    persuasive arguments seem to be their methods. I do they get loud at
    times, but never physically violent to my knowledge. This only makes me
    want to support them all the more.
    
    Christine, I am one who has had to buy the condoms when I was young and
    remember being very nervous and of course the butt of all the usual
    jokes from the pharmacist. It is embarassing to be young and "in love"
    sometimes. I never had one follow me out to the car and scowl, though.
    
    Again, I thank you all. I think I'm becoming a convert to prochoice. I
    still have much reading in the old file and some hard thinking to do
    though. It's been a long while since I was vocal and political about
    anything. This won't be a snap decision.
    
    
                                 Phil

Re: 49.7 {Prolifers are becoming too militant}

I think the pro-choicers are too militant.  But I realize that they probably
are not *more* militant than the prolifers.  A Liberal friend of mine here at
DEC sees Conservatives everywhere here; I have a tendency to see Liberals
everywhere.  It is more likely that Digital has a mix (perhaps better than
other companies) and the valuing difference policy is just fine with me.

You pointed out later that the media might be slanted.  I think that's part 
of it.  I also think that the more pressure one side gives, the more 
pressure the other side is going to respond with (plus one).  

It is my opinion that the vocals in either camp represent the extremes and
not the large bulge of people somewhere in between the two camps.

Re: 49.10

I echo other's thanks for sharing such a sensitive and insightful experience.

*** Now for my uncemented position:

I am of the opinion that people should accept the consequences of and
responsibilities for their actions.  

I know that this does not take into account pregnancies resulting rape, abuse,
nor molestations.  It does not solve the problem of proliferating the poor.
(Many abortion patients are clients back for yet another go; that is, it is
their brith control.)  I also hold the opinion that some people should never
be parents because I very subjectively think about the poor child in their
care.

So how do I resolve these issues in light of my first opinion statement?
<More opinions coming>

  Should rape or incest occur?  No.
  Should an unwanted pregnancy occur?  No.
  Should an unwanted child be born into the world?  No.
  Should an abortion be preformed on an unborn person?  No.
  Should a woman be forced to bear a child?  No.

                                     ******
The problem is that these opinions sometimes exist in conflict with each other.
                                     ******

o I *think* government should not be in the business of meddling into people's
  behavior except where one's behavior impacts on another's freedom to behave 
  as they will.  

o I *think* government also should not be funding abortions.  I'd rather pay
  more taxes (from a NH Conservative!!!) for programs to get the poor into
  education (we need reform in government!!!, people) and a means to get out.

o I *think* it would be infinitely more difficult to abort a fetus after 
  the "showing" stage of pregnancy, or after a woman feels the first flutters.
  I respect and appreciate the deep sense of gravity (regarding 49.8) for
  the reproductive abilities of women.

I have fathered four children, considered that *we* were pregnant and I was
actively involved in the experience of the pregnancy (not just the starting
gun; pun intended), was with my wife through each birth, and take my
child-rearing very seriously.  All but one were planned (the first one - a
surprize, not an accident); only one was conceived at the time we decided to
have another child in the family (the last one).  *We* decided to stop at four
and we undertook the responsibility to avoid future pregnancy possibilities 
- unless I am a real good healer ;^).  

Abortion, for *us*, was *never* an issue, thankfully.  However, for me, I 
vascillate on the "morality versus legality" (49.8) argument, because it 
is a moral judgement call (to me at least, and to me it stinks that it has 
become part of the legal process).  But are not all laws are based on 
society's mores?

I have problems with [the lack of] fetal rights. So rather than joining the 
ranks of Pro-choicers, or the ranks of Pro-lifers, (both are rather rank at 
times), I will instead deal with the paradoxes I feel this issue holds, alone, 
and that pull myself against both groups (or for both groups) to attempt to
find the balance.

My apologies for such a long entry.

    I'm not sure where to put this note.  Moderators, please feel free to
    move it if you feel it would be more appropriate in another place.
    
    
    This weekend I was listening to NPR about the pro-life rally in
    Washington, D.C.  One piece of information that floored me is that the
    president of one of the pro-life groups is a man.  This bothers me.
    
    Why is it that a man is the president of an organization whose goal it
    is to limit the availability of abortions?  (IMO)  An abortion is a
    very difficult choice, and I feel that it should remain a private one.
    
    Can a man provide objective leadership to an organization which
    directly affects women as does abortion?
    
    I'd appreciate other's views on this one.  I'm perplexed.
    
    Judi
    

    
    re 12
    
    "Many abortion patients are clients back for yet another go; that is,
    it is their birth control".
    
    Please back up this statement.  I have done much reading on this
    subject and the studies show that the average woman who aborts
    does so only once in her lifetime.  She typically is a white
    female in her twenties.
    
    From personal experience, none of the woman who were aborting while
    I did were there for a second time.  The age range was from about
    19 through to early forties.  Some were married, but most were
    single.  There were a variety of races.  The majority of folks
    said that the pregnancy was due to contraceptive failure, as was
    my case.  Only one woman admitted to not using contraceptives.
    Most of the woman were there without the fathers.  And of those
    folks all of them said that the fathers first replies were to
    have an abortion.
    
    I think that your statement is a misconception.  Anyone who has
    gone through an abortion will tell you it is not something that
    one wants to repeat.  Typically it instills a stronger sense
    of ones possibility of becoming pregnant and forces them into
    taking multiple precautions to not let it happen again.
    
    
    "I am of the opinion that people shoule accept the consequences
    of and responsibilites for their actions."
    
    By your statement I conclude that you feel abortions are not
    accepting the consequences and taking responsiblties for a
    pregnancy.  Sorry but I disagree.  Ignoring a surprise pregnancy
    would be not taking responsibility for it.  
    
    Abortion is one way of taking care of the responsibility for 
    pregnancy.  As is carrying the pregnancy to term taking care
    of the responsibility.  Either way the responsibility has
    been taken to deal with the pregnancy.  Accepting consequences
    also can be inserted in the above.  
    
    "I think government should not be funding abortions."
    
    Many people would agree with you.  Yet the truth lies that
    the majority of abortions are paid for by insurance companies.
    John Hancock funds abortions.  I do not think the government
    should be funding many things that it is, but that is the
    way it is.  
    
    
    re 13
    
    I too have a major problem with men's views on abortion.
    Mainly due to the fact that it is a decision that they will
    never be forced to make.  Sure they may have an input to
    it, but the decision ultimately lies with the woman.
    
    I think that everyone is entitled to their opinion regarding
    abortion, but the only person who has the right to make the
    decision is the pregnant woman!  

>>    "Many abortion patients are clients back for yet another go; that is,
>>    it is their birth control".

>    Please back up this statement.  I have done much reading on this
>    subject and the studies show that the average woman who aborts
>    does so only once in her lifetime.  She typically is a white
>    female in her twenties.
    
A moderator caught this statement and brought it to my attention as sounding
too much like fact without support.  My [mis]conception is based as much on 
reports in media as much as your "much reading" bases your statistic.
My apologies for not flagging the statement with the appropriate viewpoint
disclaimers.

>>    "I am of the opinion that people shoule accept the consequences
>>    of and responsibilites for their actions."
    
>    By your statement I conclude that you feel abortions are not
>    accepting the consequences and taking responsiblties for a
>    pregnancy.  Sorry but I disagree.  Ignoring a surprise pregnancy
>    would be not taking responsibility for it.  

>    Abortion is one way of taking care of the responsibility for 
>    pregnancy. 

  I accept this as an alternate sense of responsibility.  I indeed implied
  that according to my value system, if a surprise pregnancy occurred that
  it was my opinion that it should be carried to term (I must add here "in 
  most cases").  

  Our value systems seem to differ here.  I was just displaying mine; thank you for yours.
  

=-=-=-

I don't want to tell people what to do.  I don't intend to do so.  I meant 
only to point out the ambivilance that this issue causes in me when trying
to sort out fetal rights (if there are any), surprise pregnancies, and 
seeming abuses of abortion.  In no way do I mean to trivialize abortion
and to those who have had to make the decision, I can only guess as to 
traumas involved in making the decision.

I do not have a solid position on abortion.  I don't *think* it is the 
right thing to do but I am not *sure* that it is *never* the right thing
to do.  Because of this, I operate under the premise that "abortion is bad; 
now what are the exceptions?"  rather than abortion is okay.

That is the value system which I have chosen, at least as it stands today.
The more I read and hear about it, the more it becomes fragmented in my mind.

The government should butt out (in my opinion) and people should be more
careful (in my opinion) and when surprises (or mistakes) occur regarding
conceiving, it is my *opinion* that the creation process not be aborted.
In every case?  I don't know!  That bothers me, and so I live in that tension.

Again, my apologies for submitting a statement that sounded topo much like 
unsubstantiated fact.

Mark Metcalfe

    A front page article in the Boston Globe covering the Pro-Life March
    in D.C. quoted president Bush as saying "The number of abortions
    in this country is a National Tragedy".
    
    Well so isn't the number of children living below the poverty level
    and the number of pregnant teens.
    
    Why can't we (pro-life & pro-choice) agree to agree.  It is a National
    Tragedy!!  If we didn't have to spend so much time defending our
    positions to each other we could do something about it pro-actively,
    by educating the young, researching better contraception and caring
    for those already born.
                        
    It just seems to me that some pro-lifers think pro-choice people
    are happy about the number of abortions that occur.  I wish both
    sides could start to solve the real problem instead of trying to
    make aborton illegal.  Making abortion illegal will not make the
    root of the problem go away (IMHO), it will probably just cause
    a different National Tragedy.
    
    Suzanne

re: .16	

Yes!  

And pro-choicers seem to think all pro-lifers want to do is take away
freedom. (Just to provide a little balance to Suzanne's statement :-) )

Suzanne, you've cut through the polarity to the root (In my opinion).

Where do I sign?

Mark

    I'd like to say thanks to everyone here...it's clear that there are
    strongly-held differences of opinion, but your expression of them is
    wonderfully civil and largely within the rules set forth in .0.
    
    I think I speak for the other mods as well when I say that I'm very
    grateful.
    
    						=maggie 

    	It seems to me that one way we could significantly improve the
    	chances of meeting both pro-life and pro-choice goals would be
    	to compaign for more birth control choices for men (as a way of
    	reducing the chance of unwanted pregnancy in the first place.)
    
    	If women *and* men both made it a common practice to use birth
    	control (at the same time,) the odds againt both methods falling 
    	into the 2 - 4% failure category at the same time would be 
    	astronomical.
    
    	Wouldn't it be remarkable if the two sides could come together
    	to let drug manufacturers know that there is a demand for more
    	male birth control (and to help urge fertile couples to practice
    	dual methods of preventing conception?)
    
    	If we could accomplish this, it is the one thing that would serve
    	both sides (except those who don't believe in the use of birth
    	control at all.)
    
    	Does anyone happen to know if the majority of people in the pro-life
    	movement do approve of birth control?  (I'm honestly not sure.) 
    
    	Does this idea sound feasible?

    re .20
    
    Along these lines, why is it that women are faced with the choice of
    abortion in the first place?
    
    	- Where is their education about sex, the responsibilities and
    	  the "consequences" (for lack of a better word)?
    	- Schools and social services are woefully overburdened today;
    	  where are children getting their information from?
    	- What are the messages which are being sent about having sex
    	  against one's will (rape, incest, molestation, etc.)?  What 
    	  tools are we giving to people in order that they are able to 
    	  make informed decisions?
    
    What is happening *before* people have sex?  Once a life has been
    created, there are many complex issues that need to be examined and
    dealt with on all sides.  Why are we not examining those issues before
    we *HAVE TO*?
    
    Why do parents wait until their daughter is pregnant before they talk
    about sex? Why is pressure put on schools which attempt to educate
    students about sex?
    
    Without the tools, how can children make a choice?  They're going to
    learn about sex somewhere.  Why is it so difficult to provide that
    education?
    
    There is a problem today.  When will we stop bickering about the
    symptoms and start looking at how to make positive changes.
    
    Studies are starting to show that children constitute the largest
    segment of the population living under the poverty level.  What changes
    can be brought about to change those statistics?
    
    Judi
      

Regarding birth control (49.20):

I *understand* that many American Catholics do not hold the same position 
on birth control as does the Church.

My wife and I practiced conception control (I like that term better)
and had no qualms about it. (We are protestant.) My father-in-law is
a Catholic-turned-Protestant and I think he's against "unnatural"
conception control.  There is a story in there but not here.

I *think* the majority of Americans don't have a problem with contraceptives.
There can be a debate (in another note) about those forms of prevention
that prevent sperm and egg from meeting versus other means.  I'd rather
not get into that; we have made our choice.

As for men taking responsibility: nice but the temptations are against 
prophylactics (and I used to take that responsibility, so I'm not just
being sensory-oriented; we've taken the permanent route, now).  My brother
once commented that it was like eating with a baggie over your tongue.

With my value system, I hope to instill in my son and daughters the 
merits of waiting until after marriage, and the brains to prevent 
errors if their moral upbringing fails them.  How's that for paradox?

A bad joke said from parent to child who was going out on a date:
"Be good. And if you can't be good, be careful.  And if you can't
be careful, name it after me."  I want my children to be good.
I hope I won't have to deal with the rest.  I'm doing my part in
educating, just in case.

Mark Metcalfe

    Thank YOU, Maggie. I was just a bit nervous when I started the string.
    I too am very happy that the topic has been peaceful. I'm receiving
    lots of input and am trying to make some sense of it all. I see at
    least one of you seems to feel as I do, that a woman has the right to
    decide to have an abortion but you still seem to feel somewhat "guilty"
    if that is the correct word to use, about "fetal rights". I'm still
    thinking and reading and learning. I may never come all the way over to
    prochoice but neither can I, any longer, fully support prolife. 
    
    Just to prove me wrong, the Washington demonstration seemed very
    peaceful, after I made the statement that the prolifers were getting to
    militant for my tastes. That figures, that always happens to me. hehe.
    It just seemed that way with all the footage of prolifers trying to
    physically stop women from entering abortion clinics. Again, the media
    was showing what made for "good" news coverage for that day.
    
    Suzanne, at last a "clear voice in the wilderness is heard crying out."
    What you say makes more sense then anything I have heard in years.
    No one should have to decide to have an abortion, but let's not take
    away women's right to have one just in case. This means better
    education at all levels to both sexes. I don't like the idea of
    penalties like in China. No one should be penalized for having a child
    or getting pregnant. State enforced birth control is not only wrong, it
    seems Machiavellian. Now in the same breath, I say that if the father
    can be found, he should be made to provide support for the child. If he
    can't be found or the mother won't say who, then so be it. Still do not
    penalize the mother for it. 
    
    Now Suzzanne, where do I sign up and who do I write to besides my
    political representatives.
    
                                      Phil

    in regards to anti-choicers being too militant, I live on the west
    side of colorado springs, 2 blocks from the planned parenthood office,
    there have been multiple bomb threats, fake bombs set, and the
    harrassment mentioned a couple back. I find it hard to take when I have
    to prepare to evacuate if the bomb squad knocks on my door.  
    
    recently I discovered that my 60+ dad is a virilent pro-choicer.  when
    I asked him why he felt so strong about it, he told me that my mom, his
    first wife would be alive today if the Catholics would have respected
    womens rights to not be pregnant.  She had applied to the catholic
    church for the right to use birthcontrol because she had been warned
    that if she became pregnant after me, she would probably die.  The
    church refused her and told to either abstain or use the rythem method.
    my parents were very careful using the rythem method, but she became
    pregnant.  In 1959, she died of a ruptured uterus after giving birth 
    to my younger brother.
    
    Educating our young in the use of birth control would be our solution.
    However, without foolproof birthcontrol methods, and permission to use
    them, there will always be a need for abortion.
     
    vivian
    

My mother-in-law has had a hysterectomy quite a few years ago (and I hope she
never hears that I disclosed this).  She had quite a few miscarriages
(spontaneous abortions, if you will) in her time and my wife was one of
those miracle babies in that she was born at full term.  My wife, was
a blue baby and my In-laws refused a transfusion (something about Rh- and
Rh+, I think was the problem).  Of course, Joy lived.

I cannot help but wonder that if my father-in-law believed in contraception
my mother-in-law might not have had to have her organs removed.

Their values are such that didn't permit them, perhaps at the risk of their
persons, to do something they felt strongly against.  Mom and Dad have a deep 
sense of faith (and let us not judge his values, please).

But Mom and Dad are not people who needed abortion, but (as Suzanne so aptly
put it) conception control (IMO).  I find it unfortunate for Mom that their 
value system didn't allow for it, but in this paradoxical world, I wouldn't 
have my wife and children if they did.  My father-in-law is always quick to 
point  this out. Yes, you know the argument already.  I'm not preaching it; 
just stating it.

Re. -1.

The extremes of the anti-choice/pro-life or anti-life/pro-choice are not good
and please remember that only a small percentage (IMO) grab the headlines and
force you to evacuate your home.  I find it unfortunate and counterproductive
in persuading people to a perspective.

P.S. I used "anti-choice/pro-life" and "anti-life/pro-choice" only for balance.
Some of these *labels* are too counterproductive to use singly.  No offense is
intended.  If you would label me, I'd like to think I am "right-of-center."

MM

    Please don't anyone take this as criticism:
    
    Might I suggest that it would be courteous, aid the cause of civil
    discussion, and be less fraught with the need for continued
    explanation if the by-now-standard terms "pro-life" and "pro-choice"
    were used as a matter of course.  
    
    I doubt that the Political Police will come for any of us if we avoid
    rhetoric in aid of continued substantial discussion.
    
    						=maggie

    The information and personal stories keep coming. Yay, all very
    helpful. However, this morning I was hit with something that stopped me
    dead in my tracks. One of my fellow workers just came back after a week
    off to help with the new baby. He showed me the picture you get while
    at the hospital. I thought, once again, how can anyone prevent such
    preciousness from entering our world. I also thought about all the
    personal stories I have been reading and the feelings that others have
    expressed in here, and have finally decided that what each person
    decides for herself is fine with me. I use the feminine pronoun
    because, ultimately it is the woman's decision and no matter how much
    input she gets from other sources, she still makes the decision. 
    
    I guess finally, I'm still Prolife but I am not and cannot be
    antiabortion. It's your choice and I'll defend your right to make it.
    
                               Phil

<    I guess finally, I'm still Prolife but I am not and cannot be
<    antiabortion. It's your choice and I'll defend your right to make it.
    
Sounds good to me, Phil.

       Carol

    
    My mother had my sister and my brother in her early-mid twenties.
    My parents didn't want to have anymore kids. My mother couldn't get
    her tubes tied because the doctors thought she was too young. 
    Six years later, she was pregnant. Some medication she was on messed 
    up her cycles. My father didn't want that kid, period. 
    She had an abortion. Six years later, she was pregnant again, with me. 
    Financially, my parents were better off this time and they decided to 
    keep me. So, the way I see the whole thing is 
    
    	- my mother had to do what had to be done
	- I would probably never have existed if she didn't have the
    	  abortion, since my father would have left her.
    	- I am glad she had a choice.
    
    The abortion issue is not as simple as black and white. It is not
    as simple as keeping the baby or not. It is not a simple right or
    wrong issue. No one can fully understand it until they're put on
    the spot. It is also such a personal issue, the persons involved
    should be the one making the decisions, not some Jo Schmo 
    politicians, nor some religious radicals.
    
    My view is that abortion should be legal for those who need it.
    But, people, especially younsters, should be educated about 
    birth control AND the responsibility of parenthood. And hopefully,
    through education, abortion will not be the only form of birth
    control that young girls know about. 
    
    I think right now, too many people are channeling their energy
    in imposing their views on others. They should put their
    energy in the right places - to help solve the real social problem
    at the root - how to prevent unwanted pregnancies. And btw,
    looking at the way things are going, abstinance is not a solution
    kids want to hear about.
    
    
    Eva.

    
    	RE: .32  I agree 500% with your reply!!!!!  
    	
    	(Following is IN MY OPINION)  
    	Trouble is this is getting to be a government that thinks 
    	it knows what is best for you and you can't be trusted to
    	act in your own best interest.
    
    	If the day ever comes when they outlaw abortions, I wonder how
    	long it will be before they set their sights on birth control
    	also. Does anyone else here remembe pre Roe-vs-Wade days when
    	even birth control was a no-no on the whole? I remember the
    	protests when the pill first came about, I wonder if we'll be
    	headed for those days again.
    
    	G_B

    In the  June issue of "Scientific American" there is an article on
    Ru486  by  three  of the people involved in inventing it. It was a
    somewhat accidental discovery, as they were looking for drugs with
    other  properties.  They  mention briefly that RU486 is useful for
    initiating  labor, and may be useful for treating certain cancers.

--David

There's something I don't understand about pro-lifers that maybe someone in
here can clear up for me.

Time and time again I hear pro-lifers say things like "I am pro-life, but I
do not suport the tactics used by Operation Rescue <or some other radical
pro-life group>."  I can't understand how this could be.

[This is all on the assumption that pro-lifers are that way because they
feel the termination of fetuses is really *murder* of humans with rights.
If there is some other reason for being pro-life, this doesn't stand, and
feel free to enlighten me.]

I am pro-choice, and do not feel that abortion is murder.  But if I *did*
think abortion was murder, then there would be no tactic in the world
(except, perhaps, genocide) I considered to be "too extreme" to prevent it.
After all, the doctors performing the abortions are *murderers* (again, given
the initial assumption that fetuses are people), and the mothers and nurses
and everyone else in a clinic is at very least aidding and abetting these
murders.

I heard <can't remember his name, founder of OR> on the radio say that he
didn't care if they made their activities illegal - he said there is a Law
Higher than that of the government.  I agree with him.  I do not think
making murder legal makes it ethical.  If the US government made it legal
for some branch of humanity to be murdered at will, the illegality of
*any* method of protesting such murders would become irrelevent.  I would
do anything within my power (assuming I had the moral strength, I might not)
to prevent those murders, up to and including physically preventing th
people from doing it, and bombing the places where they occur.  Even if
I, personally, didn't have the guts to protest that way, I would salute,
perhaps even idolize, those who were willing to go to jail for their beliefs!

If it really, truly, is murder, then how can any method be too extreme to
prevent it?

I hesitate to enter this note, because I really *don't* want to convince
some moderate pro-lifer that s/he should start bombing abortion clinics.
As a pro-choicer, I am quite happy that most pro-lifers *aren't* radicals.
But I still can't understand why they aren't....?

D!

  Regarding "words", in our household we've started paying attention
  to what words are used by whom to describe the "sides".  So far,
  we've noticed that both NPR (National Public Radio) and the AP
  *DO NOT* use the words "PRO LIFE".  They instead use words like
  "Anti-choice", "Anti-abortion", and "opposed to reproductive rights".

  In last night's AP story about how elements of the Republican
  Party everywhere are adopting Pro-Choice planks in their plat-
  forms, a former (1970's vintage) Co-chairwoman of the RNC was
  quoted, and I believe she used the words "Anti-abortion" to
  describe the other side.

                                   Atlant

  Along different lines, the June issue of "Scientific American"
  had an excellent article about RU-486, written by the developers
  at Roussel-Uclaf.

                                   Atlant

    re .35:
    
    I think activists of all stripes need to put their energy into areas
    that they believe are effective.  For some, it's storming the Bastille;
    for others, it's lobbying or electioneering; for others, it's
    education; for others, it's working adoption issues, etc.
    
    There are a number of pro-life advocates who believe that OR is
    effective in saving individual lives, and probably an equal number who
    believe it is counter-effective in terms of having Roe overturned.
    
    my .02,
    Marge 

    I'm gonna try this again. Here goes.
    
    Having been in my own mind, pro-life for a long time, I still could
    never condone acts of violence against people or institutions to force
    my personal set of beliefs on them. Going a bit further, even if the
    laws were to be changed, I still couldn't use force or violence to stop
    women from going to an illegal clinic. In fact, since modifying my
    beliefs somwhat toward prochoice leanings, (Mostly due this NOTEstring,
    thank you.) I might even go so far as to help a woman get to such a
    clinic and even support it financially if possible. I have never been
    one to think that gov't legisslation of one's personal beliefs or the
    right to act upon them was a proper way to run this country. However,
    if it required violent acts against law enforcement people to aid an
    illegal clinic, I couldn't condone or participate in that either. Some
    day I'll go into what it would take to make me become physically
    violent, but this isn't the note for it.
    
    Phil

	Re: Why would pro-lifers *not* use extreme tactics...

	Perhaps because they wish to retain internal consistency in their 
beliefs?  Ie. if human life is sacred, then *All* human life is sacred.  
Killing the mother who aborts will not bring back the aborted babies.

	My sister who was Asst Director of the ACLU in Virginia for a while, 
has been very involved in the fight against the death penalty.  In her 
involvement with the issue she became introduced to the Quaker church because 
a LARGE portion of the anti-death penalty movement in Virgina is Quaker.  From
every thing I've read, what I heard from Kel (who attended a Quaker meeting 
house for 2-3 years), and what I've seen from my involvement in the UU church, 
(which is not an incredibly scientific sampling I realize, but what the hell, 
this is just my humble opinion) Quakers hold the one of the most profound 
pro-life beliefs I've ever encountered and they would shudder in horror at the 
tactics used by the more extreme Pro-lifers and they compaign tirelessly to save
the lives of convicted killers.  

	Given their beliefs, it makes sense to me.  

	For my personal stand:  I'm pro-choice in principle but when it came to
brass tacks, my choice was pro-life.  I had always said that I didn't know 
where the line was drawn in when a fetus became human as opposed to a potential
human and so I could not in conscience impose my beliefs upon anyone else,
but that I *thought* that if I found myself unexpectedly expecting :-) that I 
would not chose to abort.

	Sept 89 brought the news that I was pregnant in spite of the fact that 
I was on the pill.  (We think it may be because I was on abnormally high dosages
of Ibuprofen at the time of BC failure.) (Abnormally high = high enough to
treat Rheumatoid Arthritis, not just a couple of pills to treat a headache.  
So all of you taking Ibuprofen need not panic. :-) )  My choice was ridiculous-
ly easy.  I just could not see myself aborting.  HOWEVER:  I also realize that 
I was a relatively healthy young woman, with a well paying job, excellent 
insurance and a husband (also gainfully employed) who said (and meant) that he 
would support whatever I chose to do.  (And he has too. In addition to the 
standard "go to Lamaze classes and be there when the baby is born", he feeds her
more often than I do, changes poopy diapers more often than I do, shares 
equally in daycare drop off/pick up and took a 3 month unpaid leave of absence
to be with her from 2 to 5 months.)  I realize that not everyone has the support
(financial and emotional) that I had/have.

	And I'm still not sure where that imaginary line between potential
and actual lies.  Katie did not seem "Real" to me until some time during the 
6-7 month when we went from "flutters" to rearranging my anatomy from the 
inside.

	I guess having a baby has just made the issue sadder for me.  I 
personally know the great joy that raising a child can bring and grieve 
that not everyone can experience that.  But I also personally know how hard 
it can be to deal with a baby even with all the support I've had.  How much 
worse must it be without the resources I've had?   How much joy can there be 
in the sad situations that would lead someone to have an abortion?  

	Bottom line:  I'm regret that they are necessary, but I will defend and
support that necessity at that the same time that I deplore it and will try to 
support legislative and educational measures that work to make them unneccesary. 

	 I.e. I remain Pro-choice. 

Longwindedly, 
	Tracey

    re:.42
    
    The point that needs to be made, Trace, is that "when it came down
    to brass tacks" you didn't pick "pro-life" over "pro-choice". You
    were firmly Pro-Choice. You *chose* not to abort. Pro-Choice is
    not about the freedom to abort, it's about the freedom to make one's
    own decision about whether to abort or not.
    
    --- jerry

    I hope that no one will take this as a condemnation...
    
    On both sides, there are people whose views do not compel them to
    action. People who are pro-choice but don't march and sign petitions,
    people who are pro-life but don't march and or join OR.
    
    I also have noticed that some people who are pro-life do not look at
    abortion as "murder", but "killing". Kind of like war. And thus it is a
    horrible tragedy, but one which they don't feel empowered to overturn,
    except perhaps by voting, certainly not by joining in the fray. 
    
    
    And then, some people who call themselves pro-life are actually
    pro-choice. Its a decision that they would NEVER make, and would fight
    to keep anyone within their influence (typically family) from making such a
    choice... but regard it more as a necessary evil that happens to other
    people, not something to ban across the country.

    re .44, in your last paragraph, do you mean that some people who
    call themselves pro-choice are actually pro-life (instead of the
    opposite as you put it?  It doesn't make sense the way you have
    it, does it???)

    Anyway, I consider myself pro-choice even though I do sort of think
    of abortion as a "necessary evil" and I *might* try to talk my daughter
    out of an abortion if the situation ever happened.  I might try
    to talk a friend out of one, too, depending on the situation.  The
    situation would have to be extreme for me to ever have one, too.
     Luckily, I've never had to make that choice, since the only time
    I ever got pregnant I was happily married and wanted the baby. 
    But, I think the important thing is that I strongly believe abortion
    should be legal and that the choice should be available for others,
    regardless of my own personal choice.  
    
    Lorna
        
    

    re .45
    
    Nope, I said it right. There are a lot of people who wouldn't try to
    take the choice away from "those people"... just as long as it doesn't
    happen in their own family. They claim to be pro-life, but outside of a
    certain range, they don't really care. Frankly, I'll bet that neither
    camp is dying to claim such people as being on their side.

    I read an editorial in the Worcester Telegram last night which said
    that while approximately 2/3rds of all Americans believe that abortion
    needs to be a woman's choice, 2/3rds of all Americans ALSO believe that
    abortion is murder. Mathematically, at least 1/3 of those people are of
    both opinions.
    
    This sentiment has been expressed by many women in the file. Perhaps
    for some, the crossing point between pro-life and pro-choice is a very
    fine line. That would certainly explain (all of my comments have been
    replies to D!'s question) why many pro-life people are not part of OR.

>    This sentiment has been expressed by many women in the file. Perhaps
>    for some, the crossing point between pro-life and pro-choice is a very
>    fine line. That would certainly explain (all of my comments have been
>    replies to D!'s question) why many pro-life people are not part of OR.

Not really - I still am at a *total* loss for how someone could be
pro-choice and still believe abortion is murder.  That would make them
pro-murder.  This I can't comprehend.  Basically, if I believed
abortion was murder (I feel compelled again to say that I do not)
there would certainly be no fine line!

Basically 1/3 of the population have a view that is totally foriegn to me.
Pro-choice I understand.  Pro-life I understand even if I don't agree.
That inbetween stuff?  Incomprehensible.

D!

    D!, not everyone who is pro-life believes that abortion is murder.  
    I'd say that about half the people I've discussed the subject with
    that identify themselves as pro-life believe that abortion is wrong 
    and morally reprehensible and therefore should be outlawed, but 
    draw the line before calling it outright murder.  

    I had a friend in college who believed that abortion was murder.
    She had also had an abortion, after a birth control failure, and
    as far as I know, she's pro-choice to this day.  Needless to say,
    she went through a great deal of trauma as a result of the abortion.
    I never got the idea that she regretted having the abortion, but 
    neither was her conscience clear; she seemed to feel that she was
    a murderer, and she seemed to have a certain amazement at having
    "gotten away with it"... as well as an incredible amount of guilt.  
    She felt she was being given a second chance, and that's how she 
    lived her life, too -- working very hard and avoiding any 
    relationship that could potentially lead to sex.  Call it 
    "Sophie's Choice politics", but just because you think abortion 
    is murder doesn't mean you have to be pro-life, either.

	Sharon

I guess, unlike D!, I don't see the conflict.  I don't believe in
killing but I beleive it is necessary.  For example, in order to
sustain myself, I must kill plants (and sometimes animals) to do so.
While I do kill or in today's world pay someone else to do the raising
and killing for me.  I hope that I do so consciously with a spirit of
gratitude and appreciation for the being that have given up their
lives to sustain me.

What if my horse falls and breaks its legs?  I don't believe in
killing but I may have to shoot my horse.  So I see no killing as a
guideline.  If I must kill I hope I do so with awareness and a clear
understanding of the consequences.  Self-defense is another grey area
(for me).  I hope there are other ways but who knows?  I'd like to
think that I can find a way to deal in any situation if I practice
awareness in this and subsequent moments.  But I can not know for sure
until the situation arises.  And I hope that if I do kill it is not
from a place of hatred and anger but one of compassion for beings even
the being who is being killed.

Abortion is for me another grey area.  Yes, the being or potential
being is being killed. On the hand, in my view, you have to look at
the whole situation. What is best for the mother, the father, and the
child if the child goes to term?  It is my belief that this very
difficult decision is one that the mother has to make.  I also feel
that if the decision is made to kill the fetus, then the mother should
be allowed to grieve as if her baby had died.  I have read of a Sangha
(Buddhist Community) in Hawaii where they have a service for an
aborted child very much like a funeral where the life can be griefed
over and healing can take place.

I can't help wondering if some of the polarization around this issue
is due to not really looking at this situation.  Many pro-choice folks
seem to want to deny that a being or potential being is being killed.
Likewise, many pro-life folks seem to deny that the mother's needs and
life has to be considered.  Perhaps if there could be an
acknowdledgement on both sides of the both the seriousness of taking
beings life and on the other side an acknowledgement of the mother's
needs and life, some common ground could be found.

john
  

    re .50, you've expressed my views well.  I feel the same way.
    
    re .49, I could imagine having feelings similar to the girl you mention
    who had the abortion, if I had ever been in that situation.  
    
    Lorna
    

    
    
    Re the last few.
    
    I agree that most women when faced with the decision would do what
    they deem is best.  And that may very well be having an abortion.
    It does change ones views on life.  It certainly made me very much
    aware of the responsibility that comes with a pregnancy.  It has
    also made me realize just how uncaring this world is that we live
    in.  
    
    One can argue that the decision to abort has far reaching implications
    and therefore should be subject to societies approval.  However, the
    decision ultimately is with the pregnant woman.  She alone has to
    come to terms with her decision well before any actions are taken.
    There can be supporters who are there with her and for her, but noone
    else is struggling with the decision like she is.  That is one reason
    why I have such a difficult time trying to listen to people who
    beleive very strongly in their beliefs, but are just not in a position
    to ever realistically be faced with this decision.  
    
    
    Michele

Does someone have a factual number of abortions per year in the U.S.?

I heard a speaker yesterday who made some exagerated claims in several areas
and a claim about numbers of abortions. I would like to have a "real" number
and a source before or if I argue wioth her on that point. 

Thanks
Amos

    
    Don't know about America but I saw a report of the number of abortions
    in Australian states the other day.  In some states it's legal and
    others not.  I'll dig it out and post it here tomorrow.
    
    		Holly

    I'm still reeling over the law passed in Louisianna last week.
    
    ...dale

    There is one irony which I wonder if the "pro lifers" consider. One of
    the most pressing issues humankind faces is overpopulation of the
    planet. Usually Nature helps to keep population levels in check by
    making it unlikely 'defective' fetuses will survive.  Extraordinary
    efforts to bring them full term defeats this process.  I am aware that
    many will say either one is pro life (under ALL conditions I ask?) or
    your not pro life.  Perhaps it might make more sense for all concerned
    to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the first place.  

    Prolife does not generally refer to advocating extraordinary efforts,
    only ordinary efforts...to allow the natural processes to continue.
    
    regards,
    

    RE: .56
    
    >                   Perhaps it might make more sense for all concerned
    >to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the first place.  
    
    This comment seems to imply that those on the pro-life side of the
    fence are against birth-control, and IMHO, that just isn't so. There
    are Pro-Life groups that don't get the attention that OR gets that 
    attempt to educate and would like to make abortion as a means of
    birth-control unnecessary. 
    
    Deb

Deb:

  There is a high positive correlation between folks who would
  deny you access to abortion and folks who would deny you access
  to information about contraception and access to the necessary
  materials.  The proof is as near as your neighborhood Catholic
  theologian.  Unless they believe in "anti-A" .AND. "anti-B",
  they're pariahs in their own church.

                                   Atlant

    Atlant, where are your numbers from this "high positive correlation"
    coming from? That might be what the liberal news media wants you to
    think, and it might be the "official *Roman* Catholic" position, but
    that does not mean that everyone that claims to be a practicing Roman
    Catholic does believe that. Nor is the majority of the pro-life movement
    that *I* have met comprised predominatly of Catholic Clergy. Nor are
    the majority of the pro-life movement that I have met against
    birth control. In fact, most are quite in favor of birth-control
    education so as to make abortion an unnecessary alternative unless the
    mother's life is at stake. 
    
    Also, please consider if you will that there are churches that are
    classified as "catholic" (like the eastern orthodox) that are pro-life
    and but do not tell you what to do in your bedroom, but rather stress
    "responsibility" when it comes to family planning, and there are
    groups like Orthodox Christians for Life that try to disseminate that
    message in a very low key manner.

    Deb

Deb:

  The "RIGHT-TO-LIFER"s that I have encountered in my life in local
  politics have had an agenda that goes far beyond merely denying
  people the right to choose an abortion.  *THE FOLKS THAT I HAVE
  ENCOUNTERED* have all been dedicated to ensuring that *ALL* children
  in the Nashua Public School system are denied access to information
  about Human Sexuality, Contraception, and AIDS.

  (References supplied upon request.)

  Perhaps you have met other people.

                                   Atlant

Deb:

  It is the stated position of the Catholic Church that not only is
  Abortion wrong but so are all "Artificial" means of birth control.
  And the Catholic Hierarchy has taken steps to muzzle and or expel
  dissident clergy and laity.  The only form of birth control acceptable
  to the Catholic Church (as espoused by the Pope) is abstinence during
  periods of fertility.

  Witness all of the invective delivered recently against Mario Cuomo
  by Cardinal O'Connor and others in his chain of authority.

                                   Atlant

    
  Abortions in Australia
    
+--------+----------+----------+----------+
|STATE	 |%RESIDENT |#ABORTIONS|#ABORTIONS|
|	 |WHO HAD 1 |  84/85   |  88/89	  |	    
+--------+----------+----------+----------+
|NSW	 |  2.0%    | 26,789   |  26,870  | KEY:    
|	 |	    |	       |	  | NSW = New South Wales
|VIC	 |  1.6%    |  14,834  |  16,902  | VIC = Victoria	      
|	 |	    |	       |	  | QLD = Queensland	      
|QLD	 |  1.4%    |  5558    |  9449	  | SA = South Australia      
|	 |	    |	       |	  | NT = Nthern Territory
|SA	 |  0.5%    |  1600    |  1708	  | WA = Wstrn Australia      
|	 |	    |	       |	  | TAS = Tasmania	      
|NT	 |  0.4%    |  112     |  183	  | ACT = Aust. Capital 
|	 |	    |	       |	  |       Territory	      
|WA	 |  1.8%    |  6150    |  6967	  |	    
|	 |	    |	       |	  |	    
|TAS	 |  0.7%    |  12      |  727	  |	    
|	 |	    |	       |	  |	    
|ACT	 |  1.6%    |  497     |  1181	  |	    
+--------+----------+----------+----------+

LEGALITY

NSW/VIC/QLD
Abortion is legal when a doctor feels it is necessary for the 
physical and mental well-being of the mother, or for economic, 
social and medical reasons.  In NSW and VIC abortion is available 
at independent clinics and private and public hospitals.  In QLD 
it can only be performed at clinics.

SA
Abortion is available when, in the opinion of 2 doctors, the 
mother's health is at risk having a child, or the fetus is known 
to be handicapped.  Performed in hospitals.

NT
Abortion is allowed with the permission of both an obstetrician 
and gynaecologist in specific conditions such as when a mother's 
health is at risk.  Performed at approved hospitals.

WA
Abortion is generally only available when a doctor deems it 
necessary to save the mother's life and must be performed at 
independent clinics, but the law has never been tested.

TAS
A woman must seek permission for abortion from a panel of 3 
doctors who will only agree when they feel it necessary to save 
the mother's life.  It can only be performed in Hobart's 
(capital city) public hospital (law has never been tested).

ACT
Abortion is only performed with the permission of two doctors 
when a woman's physical or emotional health is at risk or on 
economic, social or medical grounds.  The woman must be 
hospitalised for the surgery but it is generally difficult to 
obtain an abortion in this state

THE COST

In a public hospital an abortion is free.  But in private 
hospitals or clinics they can range in price from A$160 to A$600, 
with 75% refundable by Medicare (national health insurance).  The 
amount charged will vary depending on the clinic used, the period 
of pregnancy and whether a woman is working or not.

NOTE

This was taken from a woman's magazine (CLEO, yes I buy it 
occasionally) and didn't reference a source.  Also, it appears 
these are only the ones they KNOW about.  In states where 
abortion is more difficult to obtain, no doubt the illegal ones 
haven't been reported.  I don't know off the top of my head the 
population of the states but Australia as a whole has just hit 17 
(or was it 18, I have a bad memory) million.
NSW would be the biggest state, followed by (i'm guessing) VIC 
and QLD.  Then SA and WA and lastly TAS, NT and ACT.


A friend of mine had an abortion when she was younger.  It 
entailed going to a family planning clinic (she didn't want the 
family doctor to know she was pregnant) and getting tested there.  
After her pregnancy was confirmed the doctor explained all the 
options.  My friend had already decided on the abortion but was 
told to go away and think about it and come back the next day.  
She went back and told them she still wanted the abortion and 
they made an appointment for her at a clinic for the next week.
No-one tried to talk her out of it, just presented all the 
options and let her make the decision.  There was never any 
question she couldn't have one.  I live in NSW.

	 	    Holly.

    

    Holly, was this the preterm clinic?  If so, is it still in practice? 
    Coz word out is the decision will soon be taken out of our hands!
    
    ....dale

    
    I really can't remember because it was 5-6 years ago now.  It was in
    the inner city (Chippendale I think) and was just a door front but had
    lots of rooms behind.  There was no secrecy about it because there were
    plenty of protestors outside but neither did it advertise.
    I haven't seen the news lately or read a newspaper but last I heard
    someone tried to pass a bill in Parliament to make an abortion more
    expensive and harder to get but it was defeated.  I haven't heard of
    any clinics being closed down.
    
    		Holly

 	reposted with correction
    
    
    Note 49.58        Abortion Concerns (*read .0 BEFORE replying*)         58 of 67
SA1794::CHARBONND "Unless they do it again."          5 lines  19-JUN-1990 12:00
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    re .57 Marge, do you consider carrying a baby for nine months,
    giving birth, then providing for a child for 18 years, to be
    'ordinary' ? I call it extraordinary in the best of circum-
    stances. In the case of a single woman, or a young couple with
    limited earning power/resources, the effort is, IMO, Herculean.

    Garry Wills' article in the June 28 New York Review of Books, "Mario
    Cuomo's Trouble with Abortion", discusses, among other things, the
    Catholic Church's position on birth control.  The following passage
    comes from that article:
    
        The Second Vatican Council redefined the Church in public ways as a
        "people of God" rather than a government of prelates, and, at the
        same time, Pope John XXIII set up a commission of that people
        (clerical and lay) to reconsider the traditional position on birth
        control.  When the commission reported *against* the old ban on
        artificial means of contraception, the persuasive approach was
        clearly moving apart from the authoritative approach, even within
        the Church's own councils.  The commission was made up of
        responsible Catholics, all raised under the old norms.  Paul VI,
        after he succeeded to the papacy in 1963, expanded the commission,
        adding bishops and noted theologians (who should have made it a
        more predictable body).  Yet in 1966 a majority of the commission
        reported in favor of altering the ban on contraceptives.  The
        majority included respected professors like Joseph Fuchs, S.J., of
        the Gregorian University in Rome.  Yet Paul VI, in a momentous
        step, overruled his own commission by issuing in 1968 the
        encyclical Humanae Vitae, opposing all forms of artificial birth
        control.  This was a question, the Pope wrote, that could only be
        answered by "Ourself" (Per Nometitsos Humanae Vitae, paragraph
        six).

        It is important to see just why this action mattered so much.  It
        resorted to *sheer* Church authority where persuasion had
        failed--and this in a matter not of direct revelation but of
        natural reason. Contraception is never mentioned in scripture. 
        Church authorities had differed on the subject in the past.  This
        was not a matter that belonged to "the deposit of faith" as
        preserved in ancient creeds or the purely theological conclusions
        of doctrine-shaping councils.

        Those matters of faith--the nature of the Incarnation, the Trinity,
        saving grace, etc.--are intimately involved with the Christian
        revelation.  By the logic of the Church's two forms of address in
        American politics, those matters should be the principal concern of
        authoritative pronouncement.  Matters of natural ethics are better
        suited to the "track" of open discourse with all people concerned
        about morality.  For the Pope to use the Church authority (though
        not infallible "defining" authority) to maintain  Church discipline
        on an ethical issue, while confessing that he could not *convince*
        Catholics, undermined the very powers invoked.

        It is quite wrong to say the laity "rebelled" against a clerical
        ban on contraceptives contained in Pope  Paul VI's 1968 encyclical,
        Humanae Vitae.  Fertility studies had shown widespread use of
        contraceptives by Catholics as early as the Fifties, and in 1963,
        five years before the Pope's encyclical, 50 percent of Catholics
        told pollsters that contraceptives were not immoral.  Even in the
        Depression of the 1930s, Catholic birth rates had indicated a turn
        to contraceptives (though observant Catholics may still have been
        confessing that as a sin).

        What changed in 1968 was not the observance of the ban but the
        attitude toward authority expressed in it.  Priests and
        seminarians, no more convinced than other Catholics by the papal
        arguments, were forced to teach what they did not believe.  They
        had to accept external compliance as a condition of ordination,
        maintaining a system of mutual pretense with their bishops--all to
        satisfy Roman edicts on seminary training and the discipline  of
        the confessional.

        This system bred a skepticism about Church authority that manifests
        itself in ways going far beyond the issue of contraception itself. 
        Some seminarians refused to dissemble as the price of being
        ordained.  Others went through the motions in a way that destroyed
        respect for the process.  The need for outer compliance is one of
        the many things that has destroyed morale in the priesthood,
        leading to unprecedented defections and low recruiting.  It also
        helped to destroy the credibility of the nun's life as a submission
        to Church discipline, draining away the teaching pool at Catholic
        schools.  The sudden unpredicted falloff of Catholic regard for and
        use of the confessional was affected by the rules priests were
        supposed to impose and uphold there.  Either they observed these
        rules or they refused to--in either case, the moral authority of
        this intimate tribunal was damaged.

        The papacy had tried to use doctrinal authority for an essentially
        ascetic purpose--the rhetoric of Roman prelates held that
        contraception was a yielding to modern hedonism and sensuality. 
        This argument has great force for people whose celibate vocation
        calls for resistance to even normal sexual feelings.  It is out of
        place in married and secular life.  The ban on contraception  was
        part of a whole constellation of rulings that show clerical
        preoccupation with sexual matters--the maintenance of a celibate
        and all-male priesthood, the policing of reproductive processes
        (not only as regards contraception and abortion but in bans on
        sterilization and artificial insemination), the nonlegitimacy of
        any sexual pleasure not "open to" reproduction (not only
        masturbation, indulgence in pornography, fornication, and adultery,
        but even intercourse in marriage that is interrupted, blocked by
        contraception, or conducted after deliberate sterilization), and
        censorship of explicit sex.

        Most Catholics have concluded that their clerical leaders are
        unhinged on the subject of sex.  Thus a stand taken to defy the
        world's permissiveness has backfired and *introduced* a whole new
        sexual ethic among Catholics.  Until the 1960s, Catholics were
        measurably  more ascetic in their sexual attitudes.  Since then,
        they have become more tolerant than the national average--accepting
        premarital sex, for instance, in twice the numbers reported by
        Protestants.  This tolerance has undermined even teachings that
        liberal priests once thought unchangeable (e.g., the bans on
        divorce and homosexuality).  On abortion, Catholics are no longer
        very different from most of their fellow Americans, either in belief
        or in practice.

    Atlant, 

    I think that you and I have definitely met different people. And I also
    suspect that I have met a lot more pro-life people than you. And I KNOW
    that I have a better idea of what is going on in the pro-life movement than
    you do. While I have met a mere handful that feel the way that you
    describe, the overwhelming majority that I have met have met DO NOT share
    those views you describe.  Those views might be what the news media (which
    IMHO has a liberal bias) wants you to think or makes good copy
    (and I offer this opinion based on the fact that only "rescues" seem to
    get any publicity). Those views might be the "official *Roman* Catholic"
    position, but that does not mean that everyone that claims to be a
    practicing Roman Catholic does believe that. I could name dozens of
    folks that fit into that category not to mention the Paulist Fathers
    who have been teaching "practice your conscious" when it comes to birth
    control since the mid-70's, and I don't believe they've been excommunicated
    as yet.Nor is the majority of the pro-life movement that *I* have met comprised
    predominately of Catholic Clergy, nor are they the most influential in the
    movement. Nor are the majority of the pro-life movement that I have met
    against birth control or sex-education. In fact, most are quite in favor
    of these forms of education hoping that the result will be that abortion
    an unnecessary alternative unless the mother's life is at stake.

    You seem to be pounding on the catholic church, but you don't seem to be
    aware that there are churches that are classified as catholic in their 
    theological teachings (like the eastern orthodox) that are pro-life
    and but do not tell you what to do in your bedroom, but rather stress
    "responsibility" when it comes to family planning, and there are
    groups like Orthodox Christians for Life that try to disseminate that
    message in a very low key manner. Daybreak is another low-key group that
    focuses on education and offering alternatives to abortion. 

    Deb

    In the U.S. I believe that the Catholic church is one of the more
    powerful organized religions.  The Eastern Orthodoxdox church, based
    on what I see in the news, isn't an organized "pro-life" group in that
    they go out and try to outlaw abortions etc.

    Heard on the radio that the (Roman) Catholic church is threatening to
    excommunicate politicians who retain their pro-choice stance.  Can
    anyone confirm or deny?
    
    Nancy

    I recall reading that Cardinal O'Connor (sp?) had recommended
    that pro-choice R-Catholic politicians be excommunicated.
    
    This sort of reminds me of the 'outing' note.

    There are many reasons that politicians vote as they do. A gay 
    senator might vote against a gay rights bill because other bills,
    which he strongly opposes, heve been added to that bill as amendments.
    A devout catholic senator might vote against an anti-abortion bill
    for similar reasons. The single-issue voters often forget this problem. 

    Unfortunately, our system allows an unpopular bill to be added to
    a popular one. Nobody wants to vote against the popular bill, so ...

  As reported in this week's Newsweek (25-Jun-1990), on Page 64...

    New York's Cardinal John J. O'Connor warned that "bishops may
    consider excommunication" as a last disciplinary resort against
    Catholic politicians who help to "multiply abortions by advocating
    legislation supporting abortion, or by making public funds avail-
    able for abortion."  O'Connor immediately denied that he had any
    particular politicians in mind, but there were at least a dozen
    New York officeholders, beginning with Gov. Mario Cuomo, who fit
    the cardinal's categories.

                                   Atlant

    Re:Catholics
    
    Odd thing is the abortion rate is 30% higher among Catholics than Prot-
    estants. Could that be ecause of lack of education? Or maybe a high
    number of Hispanics and other minorities who can not afford the pill?
    
    Kate

    re -1
    
    Kate,
    
    I don't think there is any concrete reason why Catholics have 30%
    more abortions than non-Catholics.  It could be due to the fact
    that there are more Catholics than any other one group. (please note
    this is merely an assumption from my experience)
    
    I see many reasons why unwanted pregnancies that result in abortion
    happen.  1. Lack of efficient birth control methods.  If the US
    were allowed the advancements in birth control that the European
    countries have we would see a decline in the number of "failed
    birth control pregnancies".   2. Lack of education.  If each female
    and male who were going to have sex were fully aware of how a 
    woman becomes pregnant, how to prevent a pregnancy, and what the
    consequences are if the woman does become pregnant that would
    reduce the number of unwanted pregnacies.  3. Young women (meaning
    any female person who is under college age) should be taught that
    they can say NO.  Young men (meaning any male person who is under
    college age) should be taught that NO means NO.  These kids should
    also be taught what a condom is and how to use it.   4.  Birth
    control should be available to persons considering sex.  If they
    can not afford it, there should be resources to provide it to
    them.
    
    
    "or maybe a high number of hispanics and other minorities who can
    not afford the pill?"
    
    This would imply IMO that you feel that the majority of abortions
    occur within these groups.  It just isnt so.  In fact of the females
    I know in my neighborhood which is a very racially mixed area, 9
    out of 10 of the young girls who do become pregnant keep the child
    instead of aborting it.  I can't tell you how upset I get when I 
    see the new crop of children hanging out on the street corners or
    in the park each year with thier new mothers.  It really is a sad
    situation because these children have no future.  I bet you if you
    drove by the same park in 20 years you would see the kids who are
    now infants standing there with new babys of thier own.  It seems
    to be a vicious cycle that does not have any end in sight.
    
    
    As for the Catholic Church.  I feel that it's teachings are just
    not realistic in this day and age.  I was raised in a strict
    Irish Catholic family, but I am completely disillussioned with
    the Roman Catholic Church.  On one hand they teach that God loves
    everyone no matter who they are or what they do, but on the other
    hand they tell you that if you do not obey thier teachings that
    God no longer loves you.  It is hypocrisy at its finest IMO.
    Many of my friends feel the same way.   It really hurts me to
    feel this way partly because I do believe in God and I think that
    he still loves me even if I do not believe in the Church, but
    mainly because I am seeing many folks who are very unsure of
    who they are religiously.  I do not feel I am a Roman Catholic
    any more due to the fact that what I have done is against Church
    teachings.  I have yet to find another religion that I want
    to formally convert to, and that is hard because I sometimes
    feel like a lost soul spiritually.
    
    
    Sorry for rambling,
    Michele

Michelle:

  Kate cited a "rate", so that most probably means "number of
  abortions per so many people" rather than "number of abortions
  by all the people in some group".

  I've heard similar statistics as those cited by Kate.

                                   Atlant

>    Odd thing is the abortion rate is 30% higher among Catholics than Prot-
>    estants. 

Maybe because if they use birth control they have to confess it every time,
whereas an abortion they only have to confess once?  (This isn't a jab at
Cathloics - I have known one Catholic that used this logic.  I have no
idea how common it is.)

D!

    re .68:
    
    Dana, I was not using that expanded definition.
    
    When I hear the terms "ordinary" and "extraordinary" used in
    a medical context, extraordinary speaks to me of extended
    medical care, beyond simple adequate nutrition and other good
    health practices.  It speaks to me of in utero surgery to correct
    a heart defect, or such.  It was in that context, that I said
    that "prolife" does not in itself advocate extraordinary care,
    only ordinary care.
    
    hope that helps,
    Marge

    I am not going to try to defend Catholicism...I am going to make a
    comment.  Any statistics around Catholics can be misleading because 
    a baptized Catholic tends to identify and record themselves as Catholic
    whether or not they are an active member of the church or not.  A
    Methodist would probably not identify themselves as such unless they
    were an actual member of the church.
    
    I am Pro-Choice.  I will never participate in an abortion-rights rally
    because I do not believe that abortion is right for *me*.  But I will
    never participate in a Pro-life activity either, because I do not
    believe that I should force my beliefs on someone else.
    
    I do contribute to homes for unwed mothers and would work towards
    better birth control education.

    I would like to know how pro-life folks deal with ectopic pregnancy. (A
    pregnancy in which the fertilized ovum attaches not to the uterine wall
    but rather elsewhere, usually in a fallopian tube.)
    
    A report in todays Boston Globe taken from the New England Journal of
    Medicine reports that ectopic pregnancies are becomming more common.
    
    An ectopic pregnancy can be fatal and currently accounts for 11% of
    maternal deaths.
    
    I am genuinely curious.
    
        Margaret  

    In the "National NOW Times" for January/February 1990, there is an
    analysis by Cathy DiFiglia of the 1990 `March for Life' composition
    (on page 8).  Here are some excerpts:
    
    In recent years, the crowd at this event has been described by the
    press as young, diverse, mainstream, and growing in numbers. ... A
    feminist analysis reveals that the crowd is neither young nor diverse
    and it certainly is not mainstream.
    
    The media portrayal of a movement that has been growing in size ...
    is also false.  ... Over the last 17 years, "March for Life" has never
    drawn more than 70,000 participants at a national event and has
    averaged only 44,000 per march.  Last year's march ... was just about
    the same as this year -- 65,000.
    
    Small numbers were also recorded at the pre-March rally -- only 35,000.
    The 40,000 difference ... is due in part to the large number of
    parochial school buses that were late in arriving.  Approximately
    30 percent of the total number of participants in the march were
    school children from local parishes....
    
    ... As the children from a variety of schools confirmed, parochial
    students attend the march as part of a school "field trip."  It
    appears that their schools are shut down for the sole purpose of
    attending the march.  It also appears that the students are provided
    with transportation through the school's buses and supervision
    through the schools' teachers. ...
    
    ... We recorded approximately 27 colleges and universities among
    the day's participants.  These schools were mostly Catholic
    universities such as ..., as well as other religiously affiliated
    schools such as Jerry Falwell's Libery University and the Baptist
    Bible College.  In sharp contrast, the April 9th abortion rights
    march included some 500 colleges and universities....
    
    The Catholic order associations (Dominicans for Life and Franciscan
    Friars for Life) were also in attendance as were many seminary schools.
    The Catholic fraternal organization, the Knights of Columbus, also
    participates by setting up product booths....  The Knights of Columbus
    combined with parish groups, most of whom were also retirement age
    people, made up approximately 40 percent of the crowd.
    
    ...  A pamphlet handed out at the march ... states, "...early
    abortions are caused by intrauterine devices (IUDs) and so-called
    contraceptive pills.  Consequently the pro-life movement must have
    a double objective: to save lives and to advance the conversion of
    America from its contraceptive mentality." ...
    
    							Ann B.

    re .82:
    
    I have never heard of a prolife stance that does not allow for abortion
    to save a mother's life.  
    
    regards,
    Marge

    I don't believe I ever have either, Marge.  I did hear of one person
    doing so ("The baby is a completely new life and that should take
    precedence") but my recollection is that everyone else (the real PL's)
    pulled away from him as though he'd got wee beasties.

    I believe the current draft of the Lousiana law does NOT include a
    "maternal health" clause.
    
    	-- Charles

	The way I heard it, the La. Law ( No relation to the TV show :-)) *does*
include a maternal health clause but does not include clauses for the cases of
rape and incest.  

	re:  Never heard of Pro-lifers who believe the fetuss' life overrides 
the mother's.  Unfortunately, I have.  And unfortunately, the people around them 
did NOT "draw back as if they had wee beasties".  The supporting logic was: 
"It's god's will."  (Some context would probably help here.  I'm in South 
Carolina, right in the middle of the Bible belt, a few scant miles away from
the community that raised over 1 million dollars for Jesse Helms' re-election
in *1* night!)

:-(

Tracey

    
    re -1
    
    "it is entirely possible for someone to be pro-life and pro-choice."
    
    I agree with this statement.  However, I think each person has
    thier own definition of pro-life and pro-choice.  Personally,
    I had an abortion and I feel that saved the child's life.
    It did not save the fetus, but IMO a fetus is not a life.
    
    I too am pro-life and pro-choice.  But my definition of pro-life
    is limited to the defined forms of life which does not include
    a fetus as a life.  A life by my def. is one that is currently
    fully functional without help from mechanical devices.  
    
      

re .89
    
    I agree with the way you state it.  There *are* many ways for people
    to define their perrsonal feelings about abortion.  As a man, I
    am engaged in theoreticals if I try to decide what my personal feelings
    on abortion are.  Essentially, I think it's time for
    men to stop telling women what they "think" or "feel" about abortion
    and start *listening* 
    
    That's why, for me, the deciding factor is choice.  It is fruitless
    to try to come up with a universal right or wrong decision, but
    the choices must always exist.  That's why I won't vote for anyone
    who issn't in favor of choice.
    
    (I've been an editorialist -- does it show?  8-} )
    
    daniel

    re .90 I agree with you Daniel. It is time for men to start listening.
    That's why I asked early on in this note. I wanted to hear some of the
    reasons why woman were prochoice. I also wanted men's oppinions, but I
    asked in WOMANNOTES because I wanted to hear what the people most
    affected by abortions had to say. It was important to me to help me
    make up my mind to become prochoice and I'm greatful for the honest
    answers that I got. If more men would just listen with open minds and
    hearts to what is being told to them, asked from them, and at times,
    sad to say, even begged of them by the people they should support the
    most, then maybe we could drop all the silliness and get on with making
    the world a better place. I think that was the longest sentence I ever
    wrote in my life. I would like to say that I'm here to listen and learn
    and do what I can to support all women in the struggle and abortion
    rights looks to be the front line right now.
    
    Phil

    >>I wanted to hear some of the reasons why women were
    >>prochoice...because I wanted to hear what the people most affected by
    >>abortions had to say.
    
    I'm afraid I can't share your opinion.  I believe that you'll be
    waiting a long time to hear what the people most affected by abortions
    have to say... sadly.
    
    Marge

    Marge, that truly depends on a person's definition of who is and isn't
    "people", don't you think?

  
   I learned a valuable lesson about morality and abortions in high school.


   We discussed abortion quite a bit in our health class.  As a more-or-less
   devout Roman Catholic, I was a strong arguer against abortions (not for   
   making abortions illegal).  I was very sure of my ground.    **sigh**
   I sure knew a lot more about life then   :-)


   Then my 16 -year old girlfriend was certain that she was pregnant.  
   The "responsible" (hah) boy immediately treated her as though she 
   were unclean and repugnant.  My mind was absolutely calm in my 
   decision that I would give her my savings (about $300) to go to 
   Seattle and have an abortion.  It was very clear to me that this was 
   the BEST, if not the only, viable option for her.  It was fascinating 
   to me how months of theoretical debate affected the decision so lightly.


   LESSON LEARNED:   theoretical discussions cannot always be applied to
                      real situations.

        corollary:  if you will never be pregnant, maybe you shouldn't 
                               make rules about pregnancy.

Barbi

   P.S.  My girlfriend either was not pregnant or had a natural abortion 
in the second month.  We never sent her to Seattle.

    Marge, I'm sorry. I should have said the people in this notesfile most
    affected by abortion  have to say. Although, I do share the oppinion of
    the person in note .95 that a some people make a distinction. Being new
    to a prochoice belief, I haven't had it ingrained into me and am still
    willing to listen to arguments the other way. Who knows. You might
    convince me. It'll take an awful lot though.

    re .95:
    
    It is my opinion that humanity is defined by genetic composition.
    Others clearl disagree.
    
    re -.1
    
    Not looking for an apology; just trying to balance the scale. :^)
    
    grins,
    Marge

    Phil,
    
    Thank you for the concern you have shown throughout this discussion!
    
    
  >>Having been in my own mind, pro-life for a long time, I still could
  >>never condone acts of violence against people or institutions to force
  >>my personal set of beliefs on them. Going a bit further, even if the
  >>laws were to be changed, I still couldn't use force or violence to stop
  >>women from going to an illegal clinic. In fact, since modifying my
  >>beliefs somwhat toward prochoice leanings, (Mostly due this NOTEstring,
  >>thank you.) I might even go so far as to help a woman get to such a
  >>clinic and even support it financially if possible. I have never been
  >>one to think that gov't legisslation of one's personal beliefs or the
  >>right to act upon them was a proper way to run this country. However,
  >>if it required violent acts against law enforcement people to aid an
  >>illegal clinic, I couldn't condone or participate in that either. Some
  >>day I'll go into what it would take to make me become physically
  >>violent, but this isn't the note for it.
  
    
    You have been "pro-choice" all along.  Unfortunately, those of us who
    are pro-choice seem to be automatically "anti-life".  That is not true.
    Being pro-choice simply means being aware that other people's lives are
    not my own, I don't know their situations, so I have no right to take
    their right to choose away.  I don't know if I would have an abortion
    or not.  I think I would.  That is *my* choice, not President Bush's
    or any one else.  I believe we have really got to start looking at the
    children who are already here, living in desperate poverty, and/or
    being abused, etc..  At some point we have to start caring, *really 
    caring*, about these children.
    
    Abortion is a sensitive subject.  It shouldn't be.  Not when people and
    states are voting for, and carrying out, executions, and there are no
    massive demonstrations.
    
    E Grace
    

    Thank you understanding Grace. That was what I was trying to say all
    along. I get a bit long winded sometimes. 
    
    I think that my biggest concern over abortion used to be was that it
    was such an easy out for women and men to duck responsibility for their
    lives and the lives of unborn children. I'm a little better educated
    now and so are most of the people in this country that support abortion
    rights. At least I like to think so. I imagine that there must
    somewhere exist someone in this country who would use it as a means to
    be promiscous and not "pay the price" but that must be the exception to
    the rule. I don't think we should trash a wonderful freedom and
    something that has helped to open up the nation's eyes to the fact that
    women are people too. 
    
    Phil

  Here's another interesting set of datapoints on the topic of
  whether or not a subset of religious zealots have a larger
  agenda than just suppressing access to abortion.

  (No, I didn't type in the article.)

                                   Atlant

 -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

  {Source - Wall Street Journal, Thursday, March 8, 1990, page 1, col 1.}


  Abortion Foes Pose Threat to the Funding Of Family Planning
  -----------------------------------------------------------

 			By: Sonia L. Nazario


  LOS ANGELES - For a painful moment, Kloisa Silva became a pawn in a new
  offensive in the war over abortion rights. 

  For nearly a year, Ms. Silva, a divorced mother of three, received free
  birth-control pills and pediatric care at a Los Angeles skid-row clinic
  called Para Las Mujeres (For The Women).  The state-subsidized
  family-planning center was her only link to health care: Ms. Silva, 27 years
  old, makes just $150 a week scrubbing floors and sewing.  She can't afford
  private doctors. 

  But a few months ago, she arrived to find the clinic closed.  Pressured by
  anti-abortion groups that contend family-planning centers promote
  promiscuity, the state slashed funding for California's 500 clinics, and
  indicated the entire program might be scrapped.  Ms. Silva broke down in
  tears.  When her infant daughter became ill, she went to a private physician
  - for a $60 fee.  When her birth-control pills ran out, she paid for them
  herself.  If these expenses continued, she lamented at the time, "I won't be
  able to make soup for my kids." 

  Spreading Battle 

  Five months later, Para Las Mujeres is still closed, though Ms. Silva has
  gotten some good news.  A political backlash has forced California Gov.
  George Deukmejian to let funds for the clinics be restored - at least for
  now.  In a few months, Para Las Mujeres plans to be back in business. 

  But for how long is unclear. The extraordinary success of anti-abortion 
  groups in closing the centers even temporarily, surprised all concerned, and 
  is seen as a harbinger for similar battles in other states.  Already groups 
  in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania have started lobbying drives to close clinics.

  "We must deliver defeat to the politicians who support family planning," 
  declares Judie Brown, president of the American Life League, a national 
  anti-abortion group that was active in the California campaign.  "We must 
  return to respect for chastity."

  Joe Scheidler, founder of the Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League, says 
  family-planning clinics promote a "contraceptive mentality."  He adds, 
  "People are just having sex for fun.  The last thing they want is a child.  
  So when they get pregnant, they just have an abortion," a procedure often 
  available at the clinics.

  Ripple Effect

  The contraception-equals-abortion equation can be difficult to grasp.  In the 
  minds of clinic proponents, in fact, the centers are critical to REDUCING 
  abortions by preventing unwanted pregnancies, of which there are 
  proportionately more in the U.S. than any other Western countries, save 
  France.  They see a different equation:  contraception simply equals 
  contraception.

  "We will have more unwanted pregnancies, more kids in foster care, more 
  abortions, more AIDS, more syphilis" if subsidized family planning is cut, 
  says Sylvia Drew Ivie, executive director of T.H.E. Clinic for Women in Los 
  Angeles.  "We are in the business of holding the line on these things." she 
  says.  "The line will be broken."

  For the poor, the clinics are more than just birth-control outlets: They are 
  often diagnostic centers and emergency hospitals for free or subsidized 
  treatment for women.  At the Woman's Hospital Family Planning Clinic in Los 
  Angeles one recent morning, a doctor finds serious problems in her first 
  four patients, including cases of diabetes and kidney stones.  Most women who 
  come through the door have diseases unrelated to birth control, says the 
  doctor, Donna L. Cooper.  "If not here, I don't know where else they can go."

  The practical question for lawmakers in California, proponents argued, was 
  whether to provide tax dollars up front for contraception and health care, or 
  a much larger sum down-stream to battle increased levels of disease and 
  support more children born to welfare families.  When California cuts back 
  funds, the first things to go at the clinics were education activities to 
  prevent teen pregnancy and AIDS.  Diagnosis and treatment of venereal disease 
  wasn't far behind.  One study by the University of California, San Francisco, 
  estimates that the California funding cuts and subsequent clinic closings, if 
  not reversed, could have cost the taxpayers at least $12.20 in other 
  government services, such as welfare child support, for every clinic dollar 
  saved.

  The study, by the university's Center for Population and Reproductive Health 
  Policy, also implied that making contraceptives harder to obtain doesn't 
  necessarily beget abstinence.  The funding cuts, the study said, could have 
  led to nearly 86,000 more pregnancies in the state annually, nearly half of 
  which would probably have been aborted, if past trends are any indication.

  Poor women often say that cheap, non-prescriptive contraceptions such as 
  condoms aren't true alternatives because partners often refuse to use them, 
  or to reject birth control altogether for cultural or religious reasons.  
  "My husband said I should have all the kids God sends my way," says Rosario 
  Sanchez, a plump woman waiting in a crowded hallway at the Women's Hospital 
  clinic.  After No. 6, however, she saw things a bit differently.  So Ms. 
  Sanchez, 30, secretly took birth control pills she got from the clinic.  When 
  her husband found a pack and threw them out in a rage, she defied him again 
  by having an intrauterine device implanted; but complications forced its 
  removal.

  "The men think that having lots of kids makes them more of a man," Ms. 
  Sanchez grumbles as she cradles her latest black-haired baby, David, in her 
  arms.  "Without these clinics, can you imagine all the children women would 
  have?"  She has returned to the center, she says, to get back on the pill.

  The battle in California aside, the mainstream national anti-abortion lobby 
  hasn't agreed internally on whether to oppose or support contraception.  Some 
  members argue that easy access to birth-control methods that aren't foolproof 
  or always used correctly has made rates of pregnancy, and thus abortion, 
  soar.  More-militant activists believe some contraceptives, such as the IUD, 
  are themselves abortive devices because they can prevent the implantation of 
  an already-fertilized egg.  But others say abortion alone should be the 
  focus, not the more cloudy issue of birth control.

  "Our members are as divided about contraception as the general public is," 
  says John Willke, a physician who is president of the National Right to Life 
  Committee, the largest anti-abortion organization.  The board of his group 
  recently voted *NOT* to condemn family-planning clinics.

  Centers in the Schools

  Still, a scattered but increasing number of anti-abortion groups are taking 
  up the cause.  A bill in Pennsylvania to reinstate funds for family-planning 
  centers, which were cut in 1981, has run into trouble after state 
  anti-abortion forces voiced objection.  The bill, which passed in the state 
  senate, was at last count expected to be defeated in the house.

  In Wisconsin, several anti-abortion groups are urging the governor to cut off 
  state funds for family-planning centers.  They have also attacked proposals 
  to base state-funded family planning clinics in schools.  And when the 
  legislature last year allotted $500,000 for a pregnancy-prevention center for 
  Milwaukee teen-agers, anti-abortion groups persuaded the governor to veto the 
  program.

  "Whenever you increase accessibility, you increase use," says Tom Phillips, 
  president of Catholics Serving the Lord, an anti-abortion group in Milwaukee. 
  "When you increase use, you increase the problems that go along with use."

  Elsewhere, groups are taking their fight to the public, hoping to undercut 
  support for the nation's 5,000 government-aided family-planning clinics.  The 
  Couple-to-Couple league in Cincinnati and Human Life International in 
  Gaithersburg, Md., have sent out mass mailings contending that the pill and 
  IUD cause abortions.  And recently, Pharmacists for Life, based in Ingomar, 
  Pa., placed an ad in a California college newspaper asserting that between 
  6.4 million and 8.8 million abortions are caused each year by contraceptives 
  such as the IUD.  "Unmarried?", the ad asks.  "Use self control.  It's 100% 
  effective, safe and character building.  Married?  Have kids."

  Applying Pressure

  So for, though, anti-clinic groups in California have seen the most success. 
  The battle there began three years ago, when groups opposed to 
  state-subsidized contraception began lobbying with Gov. Deukmejian and the 
  legislature to end funding for family planning.  The California Right to Life 
  Committee set up letter-writing tables in shipping malls.  Concerned Women 
  for America of California debated family-planning supporters on television 
  and even got one of the governor's neighbors to lobby with him.  The American 
  Life League based in Stafford, Va., sent 72,000 letters to its California 
  members, urging them to write to the governor.

  Finally, Gov. Deukmejian, who opposes abortion except in cases of rape and 
  incest, last year used a line-item veto to cut $24 million from the state's 
  $36 million family planning budget.

  But, as it became clear how much the poor depend on the centers, public 
  reaction to the funding cut turned angry.  Pro-clinic forces fanned the 
  flames with a letter-writing campaign of their own.  In January, the 
  legislature voted to restore $20 million of the funds.  The governor let the 
  new bill become law without his signature.

  In public statements, Gov. Deukmejian, who declined to be interviewed for 
  this story, said his decision to cut funding for the clinics had been aimed 
  at trimming state expenditures.  He also said he questioned the effectiveness 
  of family planning centers in reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies and 
  abortions in the state.

  As for whether the clinic's contraception programs actually save the state 
  bigger expenditures downstream, he said: "No one has come in and said, 'Well, 
  we've been able to save several hundred millions of dollars and here it is.'  
  I haven't seen that."  The governor said he allowed funds to be restored on 
  the urging of Republican leaders in the state who wanted to "put this issue 
  behind us."

  California's experiment may have been short-lived, but it carries lessons for 
  other states contemplating similar cuts.  As clinics in California closed or 
  cut back hours, those that remained in operation quickly became overburdened. 
  The Women's Hospital clinic in Los Angeles was turning away 30 patients a 
  day.  There were soon stories of women buying bootleg Mexican birth-control 
  pills at flea markets and injecting each other with cheap contraceptive 
  hormone shots from Mexico, sometimes sharing needles.

  Affording A Doctor

  Few of these women had alternatives to the clinics.  In much of the country, 
  Medicaid is available only to those earning less than half of the federally 
  defined poverty level.  Even if a woman qualifies, many physicians won't take 
  her because Medicaid often doesn't pay the full amount of their fees.  
  Babette Spears, who sells hot dogs at a Los Angeles Sports Arena concession 
  stand, tried once to find a private physician when she thought she had a 
  hernia.  She says none of the four she called would accept Medicaid patients.

  It took three days of calling a county facility to get a morning appointment, 
  though she waited, unattended, until 4p.m.  By then it was time to pick up 
  her daughter at school.  She left without ever seeing a doctor and is now a 
  patient at T.H.E Clinic for Women, where 80% of those who receive care are 
  below the poverty line.

  "There is no other place for these women to go," says Ana Diaz, an 
  administrator at Women's Hospital clinic.  

  Government-funded clinics also tend to spend more time teaching patients 
  about birth control than do private physicians, according to a study by the 
  Alan Guttmacher Institute, a fertility research group.  At T.H.E. Clinic, 
  for example, educational videotapes come in seven languages, including 
  Laotian and Thai.

  The lack of knowledge about birth and contraception is often striking.  
  Cynthia Swain, who already has two children with Down's syndrome, says she 
  has been beating her stomach trying to rid herself of a three-month 
  pregnancy.  "I keep hoping it will come down," she says.

  Ms. Swain is waiting with a crowd of other women at the clinic, located 
  behind a steel-mesh door in a Los Angeles mall.  Posters on the wall warn 
  against malnutrition, AIDS and unwanted pregnancy.  As their names are 
  called, patients enter a maze of partitioned rooms for their examinations.

  Ms. Swain says she is terrified that birth-control pills will give her cancer 
  or make her obese.  "They say you don't think well when you are on it.  It 
  can make my mind blink.  I need my mind," she says.  So, instead, she has run 
  the risk of getting pregnant - and lost five times.  In addition to two 
  children, Ms. Swain has had two abortions.

  The 23-year-old single mother says she has decided to keep the child she is 
  bearing now.  During this visit, Ms. Swain will get prenatal care.  But as 
  part of its service, T.H.E. Clinic will also provide her an alternative to 
  future births or abortions.  After her examination, a doctor will counsel her 
  on contraception.

[End of Article.]

    
    re 100
    
    Phil,
    
    Unfortunately, I feel there are still many folks who think of abortion
    as the easy way out for women and men to duck responsibility.  
    However, this couldn't be further from the truth.  If you think about
    what a woman and man go through to make the decision to abort, there
    is much responsibility involved.  To not take any responsibility would
    be to not deal with the pregnancy at all.
    
    It hurts me when I hear folks say that abortion is an easy way out.
    It hurts because I know the pain I went through, the pain the father
    went through, and the pain both families went through.  Unfortunately,
    there are not many people who have been close enough to the issue to
    truly understand the consequences of the action.  I still think about
    what may have been if we didn't abort.  When I walk past a woman with
    a newborn it hurts to some degree.  But still I know in my heart and
    in my mind that I did the best thing for the potential child involved.
    
    I am glad to hear that there are some folks out there who do not think
    of abortion as an easy way out because it is not.
    
    Michele

    Michele,
    
    I don't want to seem callous in contradicting you, but I when I had an
    abortion, I and my boyfriend decided not to spend any time talking or
    even thinking about the alternatives. I may have brought it up once,
    and he just looked at me real weird, like I had to be crazy. At the
    time, the thought of doing anything BUT having abortion seemed
    ridiculous.
    
    Our families were not involved at all. I came up with the money, so it
    really had nothing to do with them, in our opinion. I don't think his
    family will ever know. I told mine later. Mom was already a
    grandmother, I don't think she was dying for extra bundles of joy.
    
    Abortion is not a hard decision for everyone who makes it. For some of
    us, the alternatives are unrealistic and not worth considering. To some
    people, this smacks of immorality and a lack of concern for the life we
    destroy. To me, its pretty simple: if I'm not going to rear it, I'm not
    giving birth to it. End of discussion. (Especially since I'm black, and
    black children are NOT "in demand". So forget adoption.)
    
    I have never, ever regretted my choice.
    
    lkf
    

    Last 2. I can see both points of view. Especially in .103 where race
    seems to have been part of the consideration. I would have to think
    long and hard about bringing more children into this world. I would
    want to be consulted by the mother. I wasn't even informedabout my
    wifes 2 abortions until I got the bill. You can see why I have had some
    struggle with this issue. 
    
    For the woman who wondered what if, I truly feel for you. You can't let
    it rule you and you don't seem to be. I am reminded of the Twilight
    Zone (new version) episode where this businesswoman on the fast track
    got pregnant and chose to have an abortion and was visited by the
    spirit of what her unborn son would be like at 10 years old. She was
    awfully saddened but chose to do it anyway. I was moved because she was
    taught the vital importance of the decision she was making. She
    previously treated it as a "business decision" and really learned that
    it was a life decision she made. I'm glad you are able to reconcile it
    with your soul and glad that you consulted the father. 
    
    To the woman of .103, I'm glad you could easily make the decision. You
    say because you are black that it was easier to decide. I hope this
    isn't so. I'm happy to see that you want to take responsibility for
    raising a child that you bear. I, myself am divorce, but even though my
    wife has remarried, I still take an active role in my children's lives.
    They are teens now but they were 8 and 10 at the time of our divorce
    and even if they had been infants, I still would have supported them
    financially, and even more so emotionally. I'm glad you choose to take
    the same responsibility to any offspring you might have. I can't know
    what it's like to give birth or the emotions you must go through in
    making such decisions. Just like I can't know what it's like to be
    black and have to take that into consideration in making a decision, I
    wish that wasn't an issue. Race should never be. We allbelong to the
    human race and color or culture are never issues with me. I am trying
    to understand and support your decisions and whether you make them
    easily or after days and weeks of agonizing over them doesn't matter to
    me. They are your decisions and I and I extrapolate to the general
    public and gov't. here, should abide by them no matter how you reached
    it. I will support you both. I don't care how you chose. Thank heavens
    you could choose.
    
    Phil

    My understanding of the current adoption situation is that if the baby
    isn't white the odds of adoption go way down. Add any problems of a
    physical nature and it's worse. White babies however, are in demand. I
    think it's well and good to want a world free of prejudice but decisons
    like this have to be made in the world of reality. liesl

    Liesl, I agree that such decisions have to made in a real world basis.
    I'm just trying to state that if I were involved in the decision, and
    I'm well aware I'm not, I wouldn't want race or physical problems to be
    an issue. If I were to adopt, I wouldn't want race or physical problems
    to be a deciding factor either. I realize it would be a struggle and I
    wouldn't ignore the real world here. I would try to include the
    problems in a decision and see what I could do through reading about
    them, talking and getting informed oppinions from people I know to cope
    with using this info to deal positively with a situation. I know other
    people would think it wrong to do such a thing. (Either abortion or
    adoption of a non-white by a white.) but I'm not one of them.
    
    I'm not blind, Liesl, just willing to struggle a little harder then
    some. Please don't think otherwise.
    
    Phil

    Thanks Liesl. Phil, I'm not sure you understood my point. Let me try
    again. I am black. Everything I do, I do as a black person. That's just
    a given, it requires NO conscious effort on my part. I shared it so
    that people who aren't black can have some insight into how I make
    decisions.
    
    Black children are NOT in demand. Black children are SO not in demand
    that countless white hungry-to-be-parents went to other countries and
    swooped up babies of other nationalities, rather than adopt black
    children. White couples opened their arms to Asian refugees while black
    children went unwanted.
    
    This is not something I think about every day. But when I look at the
    black market for white babies, I have to laugh. And when I hear people
    trying to counsel pregnant females to give up their children for
    adoption, going so far as to introduce them to the desperate adoptive
    parents, letting them pick out the couple who will rear their child, I 
    KNOW they can't be talking to black women. Its a white thing. Its not a
    black thing. And to even begin to pretend that the same rules and
    thought processes apply is a gross over-simplification that makes me ill.
    (This is NOT aimed at you, Phil. I'm just elaborating my perspective.)
    
    In America, within the black community, years ago, "unwanted" or
    "unexpected" children ended up with aunts, sisters, grandmothers who
    would care for the child if the birth mother couldn't or wouldn't.
    It still happens to some extent today, and is a product of the extended
    family... so it doesn't JUST happen in black communities, but it was
    more likely than the "normal" adoption routes, because there are fewer
    black couples adopting. (I've also heard that black people don't have
    as many problems with infertility, but I can't substantiate that.)
    
    The interconnectedness of families is dying out in the black community,
    as it is across the nation. But, because the other methods of
    self-preservation don't work as well for us, this is a bigger loss, and
    it causes many, many more children to fall through the cracks. Not just
    children whose mothers didn't want them, but also children whose
    mothers can't care for them or whose fathers take no responsibility for
    them or who simply find a sense of family on the street because there
    is no such thing at home.
    
    For those of us who are goal-oriented, career-oriented, etc, not having
    kids until we're ready is a priority. Because we are constantly
    reminded of what happens to kids whose parents can't cope with
    parenting. For some women, this means chastity. For others, HIGHLY
    selective "mating" to someone who won't run if pregnancy occurs, 
    and for some of us, "automatic abortion" if the time isn't right, 
    and we find ourselves pregnant. I should also mention the courageous
    women (of all races) who decide they're going to have career and
    children, alone. Some make the decision before pregnancy, some make it
    afterwards. But its not an option I'd ever recommend.
    
    I guess the bottom line, to me, is that as a black woman, I do not
    consider adoption an option. I consider it the ultimate inhumanity for
    a black child; I may as well leave a child out in the middle of a highway.
    Children whose mothers did not make my choice AND who ended up in good
    homes are probably grateful that their mothers did not make my choice.
    On the other hand, children who were shuffled from foster home to
    foster home, and adoption agency to adoption agency, may sometimes
    question why they were born at all. 
    
    The phrase "better that s/he had never been born" has been around for a
    long time. And it speaks of an age-old reality, that every child is not
    wanted. I have a different "moral" sense from many people; I do not
    think that every child that is conceived should be born. I accept the
    fact that this is probably very contradictory to the idea that life
    should be celebrated in every instance. Somehow, I just can't look at
    things that way.

    
    re -1
    
    Thanks so much for providing that insight.  I truthfully never looked
    at adoption from your point of view becuase I am white.  But we both
    seem to share similar opinions on life.  I also feel that some 
    children were just not meant to be brought into this world.  It
    is a terrible misfortune that race has to play into this situation,
    but as you stated it has a great impact.
    
    There was one thread that was common between us that is very important
    to me.  That being that we each felt at the time and  still
    do that we were looking out for the best interest of the potential
    child involved and not just looking out for ourselves.  It is very
    important to me to make that clear to folks who oppose the choice
    I made.  Sometimes they understand that and agree with me, sometimes
    they do not understand.
    
    Michele

    re .107, good note.  It reminds me of a conversation I once had with
    one of my ex-brother-in-laws.  At the time, he and my ex-sister-in-law
    were having difficulty getting pregnant, and were beginning to think
    about adoption.  The conversation was about how difficult it is to
    adopt healthy, white babies.  I mentioned (my personal opinion) that
    while I would never choose to adopt a physically or mentally handicapped 
    child that I would definitely consider adopting a healthy black baby,
    if I were in their situation.  My ex-brother-in-law gave me a dirty
    look and said, If you adopted a black baby people might think you had a
    black baby.  I said, So, what?  If I married a black guy, my kids would
    be black anyway, so who cares?  He then looked at me with even more
    disgust and told me he didn't want to hear me talking crazy, that this
    adoption business was very serious to them.  Too bad there are still
    people out there like that.  But, Lauren's right, there are.
    
    On the other hand, even though I am white, I have always felt that if I
    have a child, I raise it.  That is a responsibility I would never
    choose to pass along to someone else, so I would never consider
    adoption to be an option for me.  However, I have no problem with other
    people who do choose to give up their children for adoption.  
    
    At the same time, I would not find it an easy decision to have an
    abortion.  I can envision circumstances where it would be upsetting but
    necessary.  I'm thankful it's a choice I have not had to make.
    
    Lorna
     

re: .107

Lauren,

I was very moved by what you had to say about the unadoptability of black 
children.  As you know, adoption is an issue that is near and dear to my 
heart.  I couldn't agree with you more about white couples not being 
interested in adopting black children.  I have met the exception to this 
mind set, socially conscious men and women who chose to adopt a black 
infant, but these people are few and far between.
        
    >>And when I hear people
    >>trying to counsel pregnant females to give up their children for
    >>adoption, going so far as to introduce them to the desperate adoptive
    >>parents, letting them pick out the couple who will rear their child, I 
    >>KNOW they can't be talking to black women.
    
This statement is true when it comes to the majority of white couples who 
want to adopt.  The ironic thing about this, in my opinion, is that now the 
people who were considered as "inferior" parent material (gay male couples, 
lesbian couples, single men or single women who wish to parent) are being 
'allowed' to adopt the formerly unadoptable babies.  Since I think that gay 
men, lesbians and single men and women can make fine parents, I think it is 
great that children who would spend their lifetime in an out of foster care 
and orphanages are now being given a chance to grow up in a home where 
(hopefully) they will be loved and well cared for.

    >>Black children are NOT in demand. Black children are SO not in demand
    >>that countless white hungry-to-be-parents went to other countries and
    >>swooped up babies of other nationalities, rather than adopt black
    >>children. White couples opened their arms to Asian refugees while black
    >>children went unwanted.

So this trend is changing, slowly, but it is changing.  Black children who are
not considered adoptable by white, heterosexual couples are in demand 
within the gay and lesbian communities.  This is not to say that gay men 
and lesbians don't do the same adoption trip that white couples do by 
frantically seeking a white child, or being more willing to adopt a child 
from So. America, Korea, etc.

But there is a problem with linking adoption to abortion, just as there is 
a problem with linking adoption to infertility.  Adoption should not be 
viewed as a solution for infertility, nor should it be viewed as an 
alternative to abortion.  Adoption was established, quite simply, as a 
means of providing homes to homeless children.  It should not be viewed as 
anything more than that.

Infertility is a real problem, but it is a separate issue from adoption.  
Research in the area of infertility and how to cure it may need to be a 
priority, but adoption should never be viewed as the solution or "cure" for 
it.

There are lifetime consequences that go with being an adoptee or a 
birthmother in this society.  To simply say that adoption is the perfect and 
simple solution to an untimely pregnancy is moronic.  

Laura

                                                    

    
    Thanks for responding, Laura. I should point out that, ironically, at
    the same time that I know I would NEVER put a child up for adoption,
    I'm finding that the idea of adopting is very possible for me...
    
    Except that all the nightmares I keep hearing about "children with a
    past" who were abused or addicted and have some hidden problem that
    could explode later is making me very wary... and the guys I've been
    meeting seem very much to sire children, rather than adopt them.
    
    I'm very glad to hear that things are changing, for black children in
    need of homes, and for gay/lesbian couples wanting to adopt. 
    
    ... and now back to the Abortion Concerns note; a seperate and distinct
    topic from adoption. ;-)

This is not to disagree with Lauren but just made me think of
something that happened to me last night.  I was going up an elavator
at Children's Hospital and met a white women (17) who was also going
up.  She said her brother was bored so I volunteered to try and amuse
him for a while.   As we neared his room, she warned me that he was
black and adopted.  I guess a lot of people freak out or something on
her.  Anyways, I thought it was interested that she felt the need to
tell me ahead of time.  Of course, I told her it was no problem.  They
were from Texas too which certainly made me examine some of my
stereotypes about Southernors.

She was bored too it turned out being up in Boston for a few months
living in a trailer park and her mom not letting her out much.  Her
brother was cute but demanded a lot of attention.  Course, he'd been
in a hospital for a month too!!! 

john

Laura:

>So this trend is changing, slowly, but it is changing.  Black children who are
>not considered adoptable by white, heterosexual couples are in demand 
>within the gay and lesbian communities.  

If this is true it's great.  And it will be very interesting to see
the results of this (socially).  Although it is angering that the governemnt
sees homosexuals as inferior parents, and that societies see blacks
as inferior babies, I guess it is to the benefit of both that these
presumed "inferior" people are being brought together.  A "silver
lining"?

John:

>Anyways, I thought it was interested that she felt the need to
>tell me ahead of time.  Of course, I told her it was no problem.  

I sometimes tell people ahead of time before meeting my brother,
too.  This is not so much for *their* sake, but for his. I imagine
it is uncomfortable for him, time and time again to be introduced
to someone as my brother (or my parents' son) I have them sit there
gaping for a couple of minutes before they come to their senses.
Or, God forbid, say something gross like "Oh my God, I didn't know
you were *black*!!".  So to save him these cads, I'll often let
them deal with their reactions before hand.  (myself, I would be
just as happy to let themselves make fools of themselves and show 
off their prejudices, but it isn't fair to use Daniel as a tool
in this.)

I usually add the "he's adopted" just because I get so bored of answering
the inevitable questions that I do it right off.  It is not because I
think either of my parents would be ashamed to have had a black child
"naturally".

D!

    D! In your first paragraphs, you touched the part that I was going to
    leave unsaid.
    
    Thanks. 
    
    Sometimes this world truly amazes me.

    re: .111
    
    Lauren, I have started up a notes string for discussing adoption
    issues.  My response to .111 is in note string 268.3.
    
    Laura
    

    re: .113
    
    D!,
    
    I have posted my reply in note string 268.4
    
    Laura
    

!D,

Thanks for the info on why you pre-warn people about your brother.
This whole issue being in a multi-racial family is something I never
considered before.  It's interesting to hear what it is like...

john

  This morning, NPR reported that an anti-abortion group has called
  on people to destroy their American Express cards because AE gives
  money to Planned Parenthood.  The report went on to state that
  AE last year gave Planned Parenthood $7500 dollars.

  I guess boycotts are okay when "they" are calling for them.

                                   Atlant

    Does anyone know if these were matching employee donations or something
    Amex did on their own?
    
    [Domino's Pizza springs to mind as an example of the shoe being on the
    other foot.]

    Can't answer that question....  
    
    But a comment about Atlant's note.  Are you referring to the threatened
    potato boycott?  There is a major difference.  The Idaho governor made
    the decision around signing/not signing the bill, not the potato
    farmers.  I considered that threat blackmail.
    
    On the other hand, boycotting EXXON Oil for their handling of the
    Valdez or boycotting American Express for their charitiable
    contribution policy is DIRECTLY responding to the company's policy.
    
    mdh  

mdh:

  No, I wasn't referring to just the proposed boycott of "Famous Potatoes".
  But for the sake of discussion, let's assume for a moment that I was.
  Question:  Who elected the governor?

                                   Atlant

    What does it matter?
    
    Have you ever voted for someone and have them vote against your wishes
    on a particular issue?  
    
    Isn't the privacy of the polling booth considered important?  Could be
    only barbers voted for the guv, and no farmers.  Who's to know?  
    
    Marge

Marge:

> Could be only barbers voted for the guv, and no farmers.  Who's to know?  

  I guarantee you that it is a numerical certainty that the governor
  wasn't elected by "only barbers".  Unless IDAHO is hairy as h...


> Isn't the privacy of the polling booth considered important?

  Tee hee.  A right to privacy!  What a concept!

                                   Atlant

Does anyone know the exact wording of the constitutional admendment (that's
MA constitution) regarding abortion that was proposed (I think) and supported
by Evelyn Murphy?  It has something to do with allowing abortion at anytime
during the pregnancy(?)

Thanks.

-Hamp

    I don't have the exact wording but here's out it breaks down:
    
    anytime within the first 6 months
    the last three months in the cases of incest, rape, or if the mother's
    life is in danger

re -1

   >anytime within the first 6 months
   >the last three months in the cases of incest, rape, or if the mother's
   >life is in danger

Can someone please tell me why or under what circumstances a women would wait
until the 7th, 8th, or 9th month of her pregnancy to have an abortion if the
pregnancy was a result of rape or incest?

(If your answers are in conflict with the guidelines stated in .0, then please
 reply by mail)

-Hamp

    Possibly not always women, but more often young girls and teens will go
    through an intense denial up until it is so obvious that no one ELSE
    can ignore it. That's usually around the 5-6th month (I'm guessing).
    Until then, you can pass it off as weight gain.
    
    There is a great deal of shame that must be overcome when dealing with
    rape or incest. What is far worse is to start to get over it, only to
    find that you have a constant reminder kicking you in the gut.
    
    There are many young girls who have had their minds so twisted by what
    is happening to them as well as the doctrines that they have been
    raised to believe (it only happens to bad girls: sluts) that they
    cannot live with the truth.
    
    Reiterating: sometimes it is the caring people around the girl who have
    to recognize the situation before something can be done about it.
    
    Try not to forget what a horribly shattering experience rape or incest
    is. For a female to go into some kind of shock or state of helplessness
    seems pretty understandable. To expect a girl to act sane about the
    matter can be asking far too much.
    
    Just thinking about this makes me feel like men deserve death by
    torture for doing this to a female, especially a minor. Cut the cajones
    and let him slowly bleed to death.

Thanks 'ren.  The denial/shame issue was the only situation that I
could think of.  

-Hamp

    re 50.* (several):
    
    I think it's unfortunate that people's views can be swayed by rhetoric. 
    Unfortunately, I can see how it might happen.  I recoil every time
    someone refers blithely to abortion as "getting rid of it" as in "Is
    she going to get rid of it?" or "He told her to get rid of it" or "Her
    parents want her to get rid of it".  
    
    mdh

Newsgroups: clari.news.sex
Subject: Study: Women's abortion stance shifts after pregnancy
Date: 4 Oct 90 21:35:46 GMT
 
 
	NEW YORK (UPI) -- A surprising number of women who visited an 
``alternative-to-abortion'' clinic in a fundamentalist stronghold of
Appalachia said they would use abortion, a researcher reported Thursday.
	``This is a Jerry Falwell stronghold,'' said Charles Baffi, an
associate professor at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, which is based in
Blacksburg, Va., not far from the fundamentalist evangelist's
headquarters in Lynchburg, Va.
	Baffi's survey of 588 women who went to the Crisis Pregnancy Center
of New River Valley in Blacksburg between 1986 and 1989 found that
initally half opposed abortion, one-third were undecided and 17 percent
supported abortion.
	However, a follow-up of 270 women who proved to be pregnant showed
their attitudes apparently changed after learning the news. Fifty-three
percent said they would have an abortion, including 31 percent who
earlier opposed the procedure, Baffi said.
	``When reality set in...they felt abortion was not such a bad thing,''
he said, noting the attitude shift occurred despite a graphic, anti-
abortion film shown at the clinic.
	Baffi, who presented his findings at the American Public Health
Association's annual meeting, said his work marks the first extensive
study of women who go to clinics with anti-abortion philosophies.
	Three-fourths of the women surveyed in the largely impoverished
region were single and their average age was 18, he noted. While
contraceptive users had more liberal attitudes toward abortion, 43
percent of the women had not used any birth control in the 12 months
before going to the clinic, Baffi said.

I've now read all the replies on this topic and I am impressed with the
intelligence and reason that all have used herein.  It speaks well of our
recruiting practices in this company that we can get so many fine minds
working with such fine communication skills.  I am, however, left with a
question on this subject that is not addressed here.  I am not
a lawyer, but it seems to me that if the state controls the reproductive
decisions made by a woman, the state has control of that woman's reproductive
organs.  Quite simply, how can you separate the woman from her uterus?  If
you cannot, then the *woman* is under control of the state...might not the
legal term for this condition be "chattel of the state"?

It is my opinion that we must somehow get the national focus of this issue 
ON the track of determining just what a woman's fundamental rights as a 
citizen of this nation *are*, and OFF the pictures of cute, cuddly little 
babies that won't grow up.   Women who have the right to choose do not
automatically choose abortion.

Choice is *not* about abortion...it is about a woman's right to decide what she
will or will not do with her *own* body.  If we, as a nation, determine that
women cannot make this very fundamental choice for themselves, then we must
face our determination that our mothers, sisters, wives, daughters and
*ourselves* are *not* fully privileged citizens under the law of this nation.

That is a choice that far too many seem far too willing to make.

    
    	   A friend of mine (who lives in L.A.) fears that she may once
    	again have an unwanted pregnancy.  She informs me that the guy
    	she's been seeing has consistently been using condoms, but that
    	one of them broke a couple of weeks ago.  Now she's feeling the 
    	initial changes in her body that signal pregnancy, and she is
    	unable and unwilling to go through the pregnancy.
    
    	   Since finding out about the problem, the guy in question has
    	disappeared.  In other words, she can't count on him to help with
    	the costs of handling the problem.
    
    	   When we spoke about it last night I mentioned that I had read
    	(in here) about subterranean markets for RU-486 and she expressed
    	interest.  It having been many moons since I read about those 
    	markets, I had nothing more to offer other than to suggest she 
    	contact NARAL in the area and see what they had to say, with the 
    	hopes that they could either help her out by locating a source 
    	for her or by steering her toward an agency that provides abortions
    	which cost little or nothing, yet are still safe.
    
    	   What would you have recommended to her?  Frankly, I'm not sure
    	what to suggest at this point.  Carrying the pregnancy to term is
    	clearly out of the question for her.  She can't afford the $500
    	it costs for a Beverly Hills clinic to do the job... heck, she
    	couldn't really afford a $100 fee.  Where can she turn?
    
    	- Greg

    Greg -
    
    Have her contact Planned Parenthood.  They will be helpful and they
    have a sliding fee scale.
    
    Tell her also, from me, that she has my best wishes and warm support
    as she follows through on this.  It isn't easy, but she's the only
    one who knows what is best for her, and no one else has any right
    to judge.
    
    Alison

    Everything that Alison said. She beat me to it.
    
    Phil

    Greg,
    
    If Planned Parenthood is unable to help, there are several feminist
    clinics in LA.  If they are anything like the Women's Health Service
    here in Colorado, they would also have a list of cheap competant
    abortionists in LA.
    
    My best wishes to her during a very difficult time.
    
    Meg

    I would tell her not to take the RU  pill without a doctors supervision.
    I have read articles (French magazines) that say that
    this is not such a simple process. The dose needs to be correct, and
    the woman needs to be monitored because what actually happens after
    taking the pill is a miscarriage. Some women say that PSYCHOLOGICALLY
    (not physically) it can be tougher than an abortion. But physically
    it is better for the woman.
    

    Tell her to call The Women's Clinic at 213-858-3021.  They
    are located on Olympic Boulevard between Robertson and Doheny.
    I have been going there since I was 16 and I recommend them
    highly.  They have many types of counsellors available and  
    good referral services.  
    
    with love,
    cheyenne

    Right on A+W!
    
    REK

    
    
    
    
    The following letter appeared in a recent NARAL newsletter.  NARAL 
    suggests that those of us who are pro-choice might want to send a
    copy of this letter, or a variation on it, to Governor Bangerter of
    Utah at the address listed below.  The letter is posted here FYI.
    
    Phyllis
    
    
        Governor Norman H. Bangerter
        210 State Capitol
        Salt Lake City, UT   84114
        
        Dear Governor Bangerter:
        
        Decisions about abortion should be made by women and families, 
        not politicians.  You showed callous disregard for the health 
        and lives of women and put another challenge to Roe v. Wade in 
        the judicial pipeline by signing a law banning abortion in 
        Utah.
        
        I am joining tens of thousand of NARAL members and supporters 
        in pledging not to travel to Utah.  I also intend to contact 
        other organizations to which I belong and urge them not to 
        hold conferences or meetings in your state.
        
        I strongly urge you to reconsider the anti-choice law.  Bans 
        do not prevent abortion. They simply make them more dangerous.
        
        Sincerely,
        
        
        
      

        

    I have recently heard that the New Hampshire legislature passed a
    resolution inviting the maker of RU486 to start testing it in New
    Hampshire, which in turn may breka the political situation that is
    preventing its testing in the US.  Can anyone confirm or deny this?
    
    just the facts, please?
    
    -Jody
    

    
    That is wonderful news!!!!  Please keep us updated if you see anything
    further in your local papers...thanks!
    
    Phyllis
    

    Today the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision, ruled that a federally
    funded family planning clinic may not discuss abortion, or where it may
    be obtained, with a patient.
    
    Justice David Souter of New Hampshire confirmed the National
    Organization of Women's worst fear by providing the swing vote.
    
    As the president of NOW in New Hampshire, I am just apalled by this.  I
    don't understand how they can limit free speech on a legal procedure.
    
    I think it is only a (small) matter of time before Roe v. Wade is
    overturned.  
    
    I've been swamped at work and at home lately and haven't had much time
    to note, but I'll try to come back to this one, since I did open this
    topic.
    
    judy

    
    
    Does this mean that absolutely no discussion can be had. Or does it
    mean that the clinic can not be the initiator of the discussion?
    
    Most women know where they can obtain the procedures, or the know
    how to find this out.  There is enough radio advertising by clinics
    that do offer this service.  IMO this ruling will not have any
    affect on the number of procedures performed.
    
    One good thing though, at least we all know where Souter stands on 
    womens issues.

    re:.0
    
    You are overreacting, IMHO.
    
                                     L.J.

    Oh my God!
    
    That's the worst news I've heard all month.  This is terrible.
    Auuuggghh!
    
    >Most women know where they can obtain the procedures, or the know
    >    how to find this out.  There is enough radio advertising by clinics
    >    that do offer this service.
    
    How would you know what "most" women know?  I haven't the faintest idea
    where to get an abortion, and I am reasonably well-read and aware.  I
    would probably try Planned Parenthood, but I believe they are federally
    funded.  If they couldn't help me, I'd have no idea where to turn! 
    (probably to =wn=, to be totally honest.)  I have never in my entire
    life heard an advertisement on the radio for an abortion clinic!!
    
    D!

>      <<< Note 49.146 by USWRSL::SHORTT_LA "Total Eclipse of the Heart" >>>

>    You are overreacting, IMHO.
    
>                                     L.J.


She said she's the president of NOW in New Hampshire. This is obviously
an issue that matters a lot to her, or she'd be sitting around watching
tv, not spreading herself thin working putting her actions where her
mouth is.

Is it only women you share your condescending comments with, or
is your flipness an equal-opportunity event?

Kathy

	Great news!

	If the Federal Government is paying the bill, you gotta follow 
	the rules. If you want free speech, do it on your own time,
	not the governments.


				Tom_K

    re .149, I don't understand what you're trying to say.  Are you saying
    that you're pleased with the decision or are you being sarcastic?
    
    Lorna
    

    I've never seen/heard advertisements for abortion clinics. If my doctor
    refuses to talk about it, I wouldn't know where to go. Sure I could
    look up in the yellow pages. But that doesn't feel right.
    
    manisha

    Re: D!
    
    There actually are radio commercials for a couple of clinics in the
    Brookline, MA area.  One that comes to mind is for the "Repro" clinic.
    
    Not a substitute for getting the info from your doctor, alas.

    
    
    RE: .150
    
    I think what Tom is saying is that he doesn't feel that the government
    should subsidize abortions....He's saying, I think, that if a woman
    wants an abortion, she should not rely on the government to give it to
    her (or even present it as an option).
    
    He seems fairly excited in this decision.....(which people with
    opposing viewpoints might view as sarcasm)...
    
    kath

    This comes just 24 hours after the House voted to allow military
    hospitals in the US (and on overseas bases) to perform abortions for
    military members and their dependents requesting them, and willing to
    pay the cost of the procedure out of their own pockets.  (I believe I
    read that this was 50 cases in 1989, the last year that this option was
    open.)
    
    The war is not lost, but it is increasingly difficult to decide on the
    appropriate battles to fight.  It can be *very difficult* for some 
    women to know where to go for abortion referrals, and I am very 
    disappointed with the Supreme Court ruling.  My sense is that the work
    needs to be done in the House and Senate to restore funding for *all
    legal gynecological/obstetrical procedures* to federally funded
    providers of medical care.
    
    Alison
    funding.  Federal law 

    
    re .149:
    
    I'll chance that he's not being sarcastic, based on many of
    Tom's previous replies demonstrating open hostility for women's
    rights.
    
    It's funny, Tom, that abortion is the only legal medical procedure
    that can't be discussed by federally-funded personnel.  It amounts
    to a gag order on something that is *PERFECTLY LEGAL and currently
    within every woman's right*, *legally*.
    
    It's also funny that you equate a doctor's discussing abortion with
    free speech.  Would you say that a doctor at a federally-funded cancer
    clinic who advocates or discusses the best treatment, possibly surgical,
    with a cancer patient, is a) professionally treating his/her patient, or
    b) (as you put it) "exercising free speech"?
    
    Are you against this govt-paid oncologist discussing the best
    (and legal) treatment for a cancer patient at a federally-funded
    clinic?
    
    We're *not* talking about free speech, but about professionals
    (as doctors and nurses are) who are not being allowed to *do their
    jobs*.
    
    I find your comment about discussing treatments and "free speech" to
    be absurd, Tom.
    

    D!
    
    Fortunately not all PP clinics are federally funded.  Should you need
    help in a choice matter, simply call the local clinic and ask for the
    nearest nonfederally funded Woman's health clinic's number(s)
    
    However, this is a gross breach of freedom of speach regarding a
    LEGALLY SANCTIONED MEDICAL PROCEDURE.  As far as I am concerned, the
    Supreme Court is now saying that it is constitutional to endanger
    WOMEN's lives by forcing silence on medical professionals AUGGHHH!!!! 
    
    Tom, are you saying that if a heart transplant wasn't covered by
    fedral funds, that a doctor who worked in a federally funded heart
    clinic shouldn't talk to a person with advanced heart disease about a
    transplant option, even if that person could afford it and the procedure
    was available at a privately funded clinic accross the street, even if
    that was the only operation that would save the person's life?
    
    SET MODE HEAVY SARCASM
    
    Great news!  Once again a procedure that is performed only on women now
    can't be discussed HOW NICE.  Now we can once again protect poor
    incompetant women from making decisions on there health by not talking
    about it.  After all, who could trust a woman to think for herself.
    
    Set mode normal.
    
    Meg     

    Lest I get clobbered for this...
    
    I thought the question was the availabilty of information about
    abortion not the procedure itself.  Doctors/Health professionals
    should be able to discuss all possible options even if they cannot
    offer them.
    
    Allison
    

re .150

	Of course I'm pleased with this decision. It will save the lives of
	countless children.

re .155

	Check again. There are certain things that you can't say in this
	file, for instance. Just as I, a DIGITAL employee, must follow those
	restrictions with respect to speech in my workplace, a federal 
	employee must likewise follow restrictions placed by his or her
	employer in her or his workplace.

re .156

	First, I challenge you to to either show where I have demonstrated 
	open hostility for *anyones* rights, or withdraw .156. Note that 
	abortion is not universally recognized as a right, nor is 
	is universally legal. For the record, I am foursquare for
	the maximum of rights and liberties of *all* people, including
	women, men, born and unborn. I think I have demonstrated this
	many times in writings here and elsewhere.

	Second, I was not the one that equated a doctor's discussing 
	abortion with free speech, that was done in .144 by Judy Blachek.
	Note that the US government had previously deprived Roman Catholic
	doctors of their first amendment rights for refusing to teach
	abortions, so this is a two way street.

re .158:

	No, I am saying it is legal and constitutional for the US 
	Government to prohibit certain speech of it's employees, when
	in the course of their employment. The SCotUS seems to agree 
	with me.


						Tom

    
    Just a co-moderator nudge to please ensure that your reply complies
    with the guidelines in 49.0
    
    Thank you
    
    -Jody

     >       If the Federal Government is paying the bill, you gotta follow
     >       the rules. If you want free speech, do it on your own time,
     >       not the governments.
     
    The "government's" time?  Just who is this mythical Government???
    
    *we* are.  The government *is* the public.  If the government does not
    offer free speech, then no one does.  The government's very purpose for
    existence is to protect our rights (such as free speesh), not curtail
    them.
    
    It is MY tax dollars, not some mythical Government's money.  I say, I
    want my money to go family planning clinics which offer information on
    abortion!
    
    We, as the people of the US, have every right to say where we want our
    money to go. I don't want my money to go to bombs, but apparantly most
    people do, so I am overruled.  However, I will argue against it and try
    to convince people less should be spent on bombs, and I will also
    continue to argue that more should be spent on family planning.
    
    As a tax-paying American, I find this decision outrageous!
    
    There are rule "rules" people have to follow to be funded by the US Tax
    dollars except the ones we choose to set.  The Supreme Court is not
    some body seperate from the people - it is a part of the government
    which, in theory, is *of* the people.
    
    D!

>	Check again. There are certain things that you can't say in this
>	file, for instance. Just as I, a DIGITAL employee, must follow those
>	restrictions with respect to speech in my workplace, a federal
>	employee must likewise follow restrictions placed by his or her
>	employer in her or his workplace.

	Employees of federally-funded organizations are not necessarily
	federal employees.

	Also, the rules governing what can be said in this notesfile
	(for example) do not hinder one in the performance of one's job.



	-Andy

    re .160:

>re .150
>
>	Of course I'm pleased with this decision. It will save the lives of
>	countless children.

    Do you really think that?  I can't see how.  It's been stated
    before, but I'll say it again.  You can make it illegal (I guess
    even to *talk* about it - even that's pretty threatening to
    the powers I be, it seems).  But making it illegal won't stop
    abortions from happening and being performed...oh, maybe even a
    few.  But "countless"?  That's naive.

>re .156
>
>	First, I challenge you to to either show where I have demonstrated 
>	open hostility for *anyones* rights, or withdraw .156. Note that 
>	abortion is not universally recognized as a right, nor is 
>	is universally legal. For the record, I am foursquare for
>	the maximum of rights and liberties of *all* people, including
>	women, men, born and unborn. I think I have demonstrated this
>	many times in writings here and elsewhere.

    Excuse me, Tom.  But I really should have said in .156b that it is
    my *perception*.  And I still perceive hostility towards the women
    in this conference from you (aside from this discussion).  And I
    *DO* perceive that.  So I'm not playing with any challenges from
    you on that.
    
    It may be that abortion is not recognized as a right, as in many
    people (you, apparently) don't believe women *should* *have* that
    right, *HOWEVER*, *legally* it is universally recognized as being
    *legal* in this country.  You may not like it, you may not agree
    with it, but that's the truth of the matter, Tom.
    
    So okay, so Judy introduced the concept of free speech, not you.
    I was WRRRRRROOOOOOONNNNNNNGGGGGG!  Big deal.  Whip me again.

    
    
    Re a question several replies ago...
    
    I heard Nina Totenberg on NPR just a few minutes ago.  According to this
    regulation (the legality of which the supreme court has just upheld),
    if a patient asks about abortion, the doctor must tell her that
    abortion is NOT a family planning option.  So it's not just limiting
    the doctor's ability to inform the woman of all her legal choices, but
    s/he can't even answer the woman's questions or refer her to someone
    who can.  She's on her own.  When asked if this ruling would restrict a
    woman's right to choose (I believe it was Souter who said) No, the
    regulation doesn't limit her access to abortion; her indigency
    (poverty) does.  So.. it looks to me like we really do have (as one of
    the NPR comentators pointed out)  a court-sanctioned two-tiered
    health care system -- one for the rich and this specially regulated one
    for the poor.
    
    So when is the next March?  I'll be there.
    
    Justine                         

	re: .150
>
>	Of course I'm pleased with this decision. It will save the lives
>	of countless children.

	Funny how pro-life concern stops the moment Mommy exits the 
	delivery room.

	Carla

    
    as i just said to the person answering one of my senator's phone,
    what, pray, if the woman's health is in danger (the classic
    'exception' for 'sensitive' anti-choice folks)? the way i read
    it, the doctor couldn't even mention it and is thus prevented
    from fulling their medical responsibility. it's a travesty.
    

Regarding the theory that the federal government is not curtailing free
speech, but instead just declining to fund.

The federal government, for some time now, has been making and enforcing policy
in this way. For example, there never was a federal 55 MPH speed limit, that
was done by threatening to withold federal highway funds from any state that
did not have such a law. These "laws" are often not even that, they are
executive orders written by bureaucrats not responsible to any consitituency.

There's an old saying "The power to tax is the power to destroy." What is
becoming more and more clear is that "The power to fund is the power to
destroy" as well. I claim that this power is unbalancing our government in
the direction of the executive. This supreme court decision makes me even more
afraid - the Judiciary has failed its responsibility to act as a brake on
the executive, and the legislature has abrogated its responsibility to make
law.

	-- Charles

        There seems to be widespread misunderstanding of the
        Constitution here.  The Congress appropriates money and
        authorizes expenditures.  If they don't want to give any
        to, say, schools that discriminate, they don't have to. 
        If they don't want to give any to anything related to
        abortion, they don't have to.  That's the way it works. 
        What on earth did you expect the Supreme Court to say,
        that they just reread the 14th amendment and it looks
        like it specifies a minimum of $12.5 million for the
        abortion counselling line item of the Health & Human
        Services budget for fiscal '92?
        
        Dan
        

Dan,

The particular part of Title X that we're talking about is 
controlled by Health and Human Services, not the Congress. If
congress had made a statement about entitlement for abortion
counselling I would not be as concerned - I can vote against a
congressperson I disagree with. I have little or no control over
HHS bureaucrats. THAT is the problem - accountability.

	-- Charles

    
    
    I feel this decision will bring more unwanted children into the
    lives of poverty stricken parents.  This IMO is far worse than
    having the fetus' aborted.  Also, this decision in the end will
    more than likely cost the govt(ie taxpayers) more money because
    there will be more children who will need governmental programs
    to help them survive.  With the budget cuts to human services
    constantly increasing this decision is going to in the end destroy
    the lives of the children who are direct results of the decision.
    
    

    re. nit
    
    It was the CJ, Renquist, who made the statement about 'indigency'
    limiting the choices of poorer women.  [I heard it again this morning
    on the way in].
    
    The other comment from the 'script' that doctors must use is 'the
    Federal government does not view abortion as a valid family planning
    option'
    
    The ruling supports the regulation that a doctor may not speak of
    abortion 'while on the premises' of a federally funded clinic.  Thus I
    find myself wanting to hand out cards [just off 'the premises']
    stating, "If a doctor cannot answer your questions during your visit,
    ask hir to coffee across the street.  Just that. No more."  It might
    provide temporary relief.

Some questions about implemeting this decision:

How can a physician possibly discuss treatment with a patient and not mention
the alternatives? And what happens if the patient herself brings up abortion as
an option?  Does the doctor say  "I'm sorry, I can't discuss that."?

Who is going to police all the clinics? Are they going to have watchbirds in 
every examining room to make sure the A-word is never mentioned? Or will the
feds send in pregnant spies to make sure the staff adheres to guidelines?

Suppose an abortion is strongly indicated for medical reasons to save the 
woman's life. The doctor will be liable for a malpractice suit if an abortion 
is not recommended. How many doctors will keep their mouths shut at the risk
of their patient's life, and/or a malpractice suit?  

This is not the end of the issue. Despite vocal approval by some, the decision
is not supported by the majority of the population. Already legislation has been
proposed to overturn it. But this going to be a bloody battle, in clinics, in
Congress, and in courtrooms.

Bruce

    The 'what if the patient _asks_?' issue was covered.  The scripted
    response from the physician is to be [per regulation] 'Abortion is not
    a federally approved family planning alternative.' Period. no further
    comment to be made by the physician. If the patient further asked
    'where can I go to get information on abortion?' the statement is to be
    repeated. period. no further comment.
    
    hence, my note card suggestion ...

re .162:

>	The Supreme Court is not some body separate from the people - it 
>	is a part of the government which, in theory, is *of* the people.

	A lot of folks said the same thing after Roe v Wade was handed down.

re .163:

	Right on both counts, but what's the point?

re .164:

	Yes I really think that. And it makes me sad that you perceive
	me as hostile. Lastly, I think that pointing out an error
	is hardly "whipping". What would you have me do, take criticism
	for something I did not do? If that comes across as hostile,
	I am sorry for not saying it better.

re .166

	Pretty broad brush you are using. But retaliating in kind, even 
	though it would be accurate, would accomplish nothing except to
	raise tempers. I decline to participate.

re .172

	Provided the Doctor met on her/his own time.


re .173

	Bad analogy. A better one would be for me to say that I, as
	a former and potential buyer of Digital stock, said something like, 
	either delete any of, say, Ann Broomhead's entries in this conference, 
	or I am going to stop buying stock. Then the corporation would be 
	faced with a decision: accede to my demands, or do without my 
	largess, which it could make on any number of basis, including
	the reasonableness of the demand, the importance of the income
	in jeopardy, etc. That seems completely fair. 

						Tom_K

So once again, poor women and poor families lose out.  
People who most need the help of federal funding are limited in their
ability to control the size of their family.  Well-off families still
have the means to go to private health care providers, and get
information important to their rights as human beings and quality of
life.  Poor women can not be given the information.

Liberty and justice for all, as long as you can pay for it?

	MKV

    A couple of points were missed here:
    
    First, the item in question is *not* a law, its an executive order (I
    think that's the legal term).  This decision essentially gives the
    executive branch the power to decree how laws passed by Congress can be
    interpreted. In 1971 Congress passed a law saying that federally funded
    clinics couldn't *perform* abortions.  This has extremely negative
    implications for a government that is based on the balance of powers.
    
    And it does set a significant, negative, precedent for free speech.  
    What implications does it have if we go towards a national health
    system?  What about scientific research that gets NIH or NSF grants?
    
    When Congress votes to override the SC decision (by putting forth a new
    law that counteracts the exec order), it will be very interesting to
    see what the margin is.  Only 4 votes needed for veto override...
    
    Jim

    I don't know but I imagine the doctors of this country aren't going
    to like being gagged.  Hopefully, they will have the strength and
    power to protest this ridiculous 'executive order.'
    
    Yes, the poor who can least afford more children are the ones who
    will have more children, unwanted and impoverished.
    
    Oh well, who cares I suppose, I mean the ocean is clean off of the
    Kennebunkport coast, isn't it?  Good sailing weekend.
    
    M.
    

    re.176 [in.re. my previous]
    
    of course, on hir own time.  I would not suggest otherwise under the
    present circumstance.  if a doctor is committed to choice, and I know
    many who are, there is nothing in the executive order prohibiting chat
    over a cup of coffee, just bringing up the subject or answering
    questions or inferring that s/he might answer questions across the
    street whilst _on the premises_.  of course, many doctors may not
    choose to meet with a desperate woman [and that is _their_ choice].
    
    
    re.179
    
    Maia,
    
    The doctors of this country have indeed had 'the strength and the power
    to protest' the regulation.  It was a challenge brought by a doctor
    [with considerable peer backing] that took the matter as far as the
    Supreme Court.  The Court upheld the executive order/regulation; the
    challenge failed.
    
      Annie

    this is not about an executive order, it is about department
    regulations which implement and manage the public laws.
    
    i lived in the Washington DC area for many years, until i interned with
    a woman's rights organization, without knowing how the US is really
    governed.
    
    you have the executive branch, which included the various departments
    like Health and Human Services, the legislative branch and the judicial
    branch.
    
    the legislative branch passes public laws.  to implement the public
    laws, the appropriate executive branch department formulates
    regulations, which are open to comment and then they publish the real
    ones.  it is the regulations which govern us, and those regulations are
    controlled by the executive branch.
    
    after 11.d years of reagan/bush, this country's laws have been
    adulterated and abused by the regulations written by those controlled
    by reagan/bush.  
    
    i think if more people in the US knew how things were really run in DC,
    they would be very surprised.  the US is not governed by the majority
    but by the rich few who know how to manipulate the system to their own
    advantage.  if you think that most of the people in control in DC are
    concerned with the majority, you  are in for a big surprise.
    
    BTW, those regulations can be written so that the essence of the public
    law is changed, if that is their intent.  i saw it happen with the Job
    Training Partnership Act.
    
    sue

    I really don't think I'm over-reacting in my initial assesment of this
    decision.  To not allow a doctor to discuss a *legal* procedure with
    women who have few options is unconscionable.  
    
    This is a clear sign of how the court is heading.  It's only a matter
    of time before a case appears before them that will reverse Roe.  Then
    any state that never revised their old laws (including NH) will revert
    back to those old laws.
    
    We will pay for the appointments that Reagan made to the court system
    for the next 30 years.  It feels like a long hard battle to me.
    
    judy
    
    

    Many notes back Jody asked about RU486 being part of a resolution in
    New Hampshire.  It passed the NH House by an extremely wide margin. 
    It was supposed to be a toss-up  in the Senate, but ended up passing 13
    to 9 with one senator abstaining.
    
    A non-binding resolution does not need the governor's signature, which
    we certainly never would get from Judd Gregg.  The anti-choice groups
    are now claiming that it does need his signature and are supposedly
    pursing this in the courts.  
    
    I don't think the resolution will do much in terms of testing in NH. 
    We have limited teaching hospitals.  What the resolution does do is
    it lets the drug company know that there is support for them to try to
    get RU486 into the United States. California legislators are going to
    try to pass the resolution there next.
    
    judy

Judy:

    
> A non-binding resolution does not need the governor's signature, which
> we certainly never would get from Judd Gregg.  The anti-choice groups
> are now claiming that it does need his signature and are supposedly
> pursing this in the courts.  
    
  Thanks to a NEW_HAMPSHIRE noter, the full text of an article about
  this from "The Manchester Union Liar", err, I mean "Leader" is in
  Note 544.8 here in =WN=.

                                   Atlant

    
    Following is a letter written by Planned Parenthood and published in
    today's New York Times.  Planned Parenthood strongly suggests that if
    you are pro-choice, or have the slightest interest in maintaining First 
    Amendment rights, you send this letter to your state senators and house 
    representatives.  Also, anyone who's inclined to donate money to Planned 
    Parenthood might consider this a good time as they are giving up the 
    government's funds in lieu of complying with the "gag rule".
    
    "One must wonder what force the First Amendment retains if it is read
    to countenance the deliberate manipulation by the Government of the
    dialogue between a woman and her physician."
    
    				- Justice Blackman in his dissent
    
    
    
    The Honorable <fill in the blank>
    United States Senate <or United States House of Representatives>
    Washington, DC 20510 <or 20515 for House of Reps>
    
    Dear <fill in the blank>:
    
    I was outraged by the May 23rd Supreme Court decision in Rust v.
    Sullivan.  I urge you to untie the gag on federally funded family
    planning clinics by voting for S. 323 - and if necessary, overriding a
    Presidential veto.  Please also reauthorize Title X without language
    that restricts the free speech of health professionals.
    
    Sincerely,
    
    
    
    _______________________________________
    NAME
    
    
    
    _______________________________________
    ADDRESS
    
    
    
    _______________________________________
    CITY/STATE/ZIP
    

	Oddly enough, I donated some money to Planned Parenthood in 
	January -- they still haven't cashed my check.

	Thanks for the letter template.  Will send facsimiles to my 
	legislative people post haste.

	Carla

       
    Following is another Planned Parenthood letter from today's New York
    Times.  No editing necessary - just extract, sign and mail.
    
    
    
    Majority Leader George Mitchell
    United States Senate
    Washington, DC 20510
    
    Title X, the nation's family planning program, has worked well for 20
    years.  The Supreme Court's ruling in Rust v. Sullivan is nothing less
    than a public health disaster.  Title X must be rescued from
    regulations designed to destroy it.  It must be strengthened to serve
    every woman in need of care and reauthorized free of restrictive
    amendments.  Please take action now.
    
    
    
    _________________________________
    NAME
    
    
    
    _________________________________
    ADDRESS
    
    
    
    _________________________________
    CITY/STATE/ZIP
    
    

    I think .183 was saying this decision shows which way the wind's
    blowing.  It may not be one quick step, but the steps are slowly moving
    in a certain direction.  And that's scary.

  As I understand it, there are cases "in the pipeline" to the Supreme
  Court that could easy be used to over-turn Roe v. Wade.  Based on
  that, I don't think Judy was over-reacting at all.

                                   Atlant

    I am pro-choice.  But they could abolish all the abortions laws
    tomorrow if every pro-life person adopted/financially supported an
    unwanted child.  
    I read some shocking statistics about how angry/abusive women are toward 
    their unwanted children.  If we really want them to live, let's give
    them a life worth living.
    
    Debbie

    Our 'problem' is that we did not over-react fast enough or long enough.
    After our first "victory," we should have realized that if we didn't
    continue the fight, we would begin to lose again.  IMHO, we have to
    over-react on every womens' rights issues, from here on out.  Let's
    throw a temper tantrum, maybe then we'll be heard.
    
    M.
    

 I am interested in hearing women's opinions on this item.

 I heard last night that one of the states has introduced legislation that
would mandate (among other things) a waiting period before a woman could have 
an abortion. This question is particularly directed towards women who have
expressed the sentiment that a waiting period to buy a firearm is not an 
infringement of the right to keep and bear arms as expressed in the 2nd 
amendment of the constitution: Is a waiting period to obtain an abortion an
infringement on a woman's rights? Why or why not? And can you reconcile your
opinion with your opinion about waiting periods and firearms? What makes these
issues so different?

 The Doctah

    The difference is that abortions are time-dependent - if you don't get
    one *now*, you may not be able to get one at all.
    
    Guns are nonperishable items.
    
    D!

    There's a very simple answer, but I suspect the wrath of the moderator
    goddesses would descend if I posted it.
    
    Jim

    re .194, I don't understand why there would be a waiting period for
    abortions.  Wait for what?  
    
    I thought some people advocated waiting periods before the purchase of
    firearms because supposedly the person who wanted to buy the gun would
    be checked out to see if they were a former mental patient, or whatnot?
    I don't see how this would apply to women who wanted abortions?  
    
    I'm confused as to why this would be similar.
    
    Lorna
    

    
    
    RE: waiting period for abortion
    
    Maybe to allow the person enough time to change their mind if they want
    to....enough time to allow the decision that they have made to sink in
    and take hold.....
    
    Since it's a very emotional decision, and a very difficult one to make,
    giving the person a chance to think about it might be a good idea.
    
    kath

    People in urban areas might be tempted to think that it's a good idea 
    (after all, what's the harm of waiting?).  In rural or midwestern
    states it can be a 2+ hour drive (or much, much longer) to a clinic
    and waiting a week means you have to make that drive again.  Count
    in gas costs etc., and it might really become a hardship for some
    women.
    
    Ji
    

    
    Maybe there's a parallel in the plant world...you know, the sex
    pistils.
    
    =%-}
    
    D.

>     The difference is that abortions are time-dependent - if you don't get
>    one *now*, you may not be able to get one at all.
>    
>    Guns are nonperishable items.

if your life has been threatened by an ex-spouse and he's out on parole and
headed your way, a waiting period on handguns makes your *life* a perishable
item.  This is convincing enough for me, that substantial waiting periods 
have no place in either transaction.

DougO

    Doug, whether or not waiting periods have a place in the gun world (I
    have no opinion) it seems pretty clear to me the *difference* between
    an abortion and buying a gun.
    
    An abortion may not wait.  The gun will wait.  Maybe *you* can't wait
    for the gun, but the gun will wait.  The abortion won't.
    
    D!

The person's need won't wait, D!

DougO

The waiting period on guns has two purposes: one, to allow time for a
background check, and two, to allow anyone who was planning to use the
gun to commit a crime to "cool off", and possibly change their mind.

I don't see either rationale as being equivalent for a medical
procedure.  To me, legislating a waiting period for abortions is the
first step towards one of the following: using some criteria to decide
which women can legally have an abortion, or two, declaring the procedure a crime.

I find the suggestion that it be mandated to "give the woman a chance
to rethink her decision" somewhat offensive.  I do not believe that
women walk into abortion clinics on the spur of the moment, or as the
result of some momentary panic.  To me, this argument implies that
[some] women are so frivolous that the state has to tell them (us) to think.

There is an inherent time limit here.  It's like the old joke about how
you never have to worry about your parachute not opening: if the first
one doesn't open, then you open the backup and count to ten.  By the
time you know the second one's not going to open, you're only ten feet
from the ground - and anyone can jump ten feet.  Tell a group of women
they'll have to wait 10 months for an abortion, and I'll bet they'll
*all* change their minds about having it done legally.

    Sharon

    Oh sure.  Let's compare women to guns.
    
    Maia
    

    Actually, I don't personally know of any abortion facility which
    performs the operation on the same day that you request it.  That means
    there is a built-in waiting period, without any legal mandate for it. 
    Those few days/weeks of reviewing, rethinking, pondering, arguing, over
    and over, the decision to abort can be very stressful.  I'm told that
    some percentage of women do change their minds during this period. 
    However, that very stress can be a crucible which helps the woman
    refine her reasoning and understand its implications, such that she can
    stand up to the slings and arrows of the morally self-righteous who
    will cavalierly dismiss her pain as she goes forward from her testing
    ground.
    
    And I sincerely and honestly wish that those who would outlaw the
    availability of abortion would go back and remember their pre-1973
    history.  The rate of attempted abortion does not seem to be radically
    different.  What is different is the survival rates of the women who
    undergo the procedure.  The belief that outlawing abortion will mean
    that it is eliminated is, in my opinion, naive in the extreme.
    
    
    Alison
    
    
    (I am personally opposed to a waiting period for firearms purchase
    also, although a reasonable period while being investigated for a 
    *license* may be ok).

I find the "make the woman stop and think about it" rationale 
offensive too.  That's assuming she hasn't already thought about it,
and seems extremely patronizing.  Seems to me that by the time a woman
has found out she is pregnant and decided what to do, she's done plenty
of thinking.

	MKV

    Usually I do not reply to discussions on abortion.  But I feel the need
    today.  As a group we are a very small sample representative of women.
    Often when we discuss things we look at the subject matter from an
    intellectual viewpoint.  Most of us make decisions on a daily basis
    that we are held accountable for.
    
    Abortion is not only a personal decision but it is also for many of us
    a moral dilema.  If you choose to have an abortion that is your
    decision.  If I were to choose to have an abortion I would in fact be
    killing my very own child.
    
    Abortion rights activists are adamant that a woman have control over
    her own body  And I totally agree.  I have heard and understood the
    logic that the fetus does not become a human until a given time.  I
    respect that belief.
    
    This waiting rule is for those of us that are not of the same belief. 
    It is for the thousands of young woman that are forced into a procedure
    that they do not want or do not believe is a moral decision.  It gives
    them one more opportunity to select another alternative.
    
    There are thousands of potential mothers that are convinced to abort
    their children for the convenience of their parents or the father of
    the child.  In the first few months of pregnancy a woman is at her most
    vulnerable emotionally.
    
    I agree many pro-life folks fail to follow through and provide answers
    for unwanted children born of unprepared parents.
    
    But I have yet to see an abortion rights group that deals with the
    reality of the emotional trauma an abortion inflicts on some women.  It
    is often poofed away by not acknowledging the belief a child is 
    created conception.
    
    People who staff abortion clinics are workers just like you and I. 
    Their motives can and probably are in some way linked to their belief
    system and their desire to have work the next day and the next week.
    
    This law is for the person like myself who would want the opportunity
    to think twice about what would be for me the biggest decision in my
    life!  I have supported those of you who have different belief systems
    for years....it sure would be nice if you acknowledged mine.

    
    How about a waiting period for aroused males?
    
    D.

    re.208
    
    Joyce,
    
    I am not an abortion rights 'group', I am only a woman.  I am an
    abortion rights activist, and a part of a group.
    
    I have know _many_ abortion rights activists, like myself, who
    have staffed pregnancy crisis centers and domestic crisis outreach
    centers where _a lot_ of time is spent in talking to women and children
    seeking abortions.  Quite a bit of talking through these decisions
    happens.  Many offer grief-counselling and follow-up assistance with
    the emotional fall-out; most try to speak of the fall-out up front.
    
    I have experienced the grief/frustration you speak of when you refer to
    pressure from parents, lovers, et al.  My own mother once made an
    abortion an absolute condition for continued shelter for my sister --
    and my mother is unshakable in her conviction that abortion is a sin
    for which there is no salvation.  My sister with no where to turn caved
    in to the pressure [I didn't here about it until a couple years after
    the fact] and experiences periods of depression around both the
    anniversary of the abortion and the would-have-been birthdate 8 years
    later.
    
    There is more to the pro-choice, abortion rights front than impassioned
    rhetoric.
    
      Annie

    Annie the question is will the time period eleviate the problem or
    would it have helped the situation in your family.
    
    My reason for liking the waiting period is that it may help some people
    do what is right for them.  I know that there are folks that help
    others through the grieving process and that is good.
    
    A waiting period might allow someone the time to decide to have the
    child!  
    
    I hope you all notice that I am using the word child...this is my
    belief system.  I don't expect it to be yours.  And I have never used
    the same word when I am discussing abortion in terms of people whose
    belief system is different then mine.  
    
    If Jane Jones wants the right to abort a fetus I will never deny it to
    her.  If she has a strong belief system that allows her to do this, if
    she does it freely and without coercion it is her right and I will
    defend that right.
    
    But I want Jane to realize that some women are not as strong as she is. 
    Some women have different belief systems.  Some women are being
    controlled by men and parents to do things that they are not
    comfortable doing.  I want Jane to help by legislating a waiting
    period.
    
    Women's bodies cannot be compared to guns and/or contracts.  But once
    you have an abortion you cannot change your mind unlike the contract
    you sign in haste.  For some of us a decision made in haste could haunt
    us for life.  
    
    To me this is not the beginning of the end of women's rights.  It is
    a piece of legislation that will also insure the rights of women.  It
    may be a little inconvenient for some of our sisters...but hopefully it
    will help another less vocal group of women.

    Oooops!  I just had a terrible thought:  Suppose a waiting period
    means that the people nagging at the woman to do whichever it is she
    doesn't want just have longer to nag at her?
    
    						Ann B.

    .208
    
    I respect your feelings, but what gives you the idea that there
    are thousands of young women who are forced into having abortions?
    No one is holding a gun to their heads making them head for that
    clinic.  
    
    A waiting period simply adds to the stress, as another noter said
    by the time a woman knows she's pregnant and has decided to abort,
    she'd done plenty of thinking.
    
    Maia
    

    
    re .213
    
    I remember hearing of a girl whose mother forced her to have an
    abortion. She was 13. Her father was very pro-life and was absolutely
    incensed at his ex-wife's decision. Apparently, the 13 year old wanted
    to keep the baby.
    
    Frankly, I thought the mother did the right thing, but then, I'm not
    pro-life. At any rate, it DOES happen. Maybe not with a gun, but I
    think we all know that peer pressure is a powerful force. As can be
    parental pressure, and the pressure of one's boyfriend. The simple
    threat to withdraw all forms of emotional support would be enough to
    scare a lot of confused young teens grappling with such a choice.
    At 13, if I had to choose between losing my parents, boyfriend and
    friends, and aborting, especially if NO ONE came forward to say: its
    okay to have the baby, I don't think I could stand up to the pressure,
    even if I was very pro-life.

    re. Joyce
    
    In _my_ family, instituting a waiting period would have accomplished
    absolutely nothing.  My mother would have put Wendy on an airplane to
    Canada or Switzerland or where-ever with a limited amount of funds with
    'abort or you're on your own' --- payment for the procedure
    would have been accomplished by means of wire-transfer.
    
    A waiting period would only punish those without the means to
    circumvent it.

I guess I have to be against any waiting period, beyond what is medically 
needed anyway (for blood work, etc, which any responsible clinic will do, yes?).

Joyce, Ann, 'ren, everyone, pressure will come to a woman from _some_ direction
no matter what she decides to do.  Remember my note about "whose rights are
these", about the woman whose husband berated her for not aborting their child?
She is still under horrible stress and pressure, as a result of her choice.

The law should not interfere any more than it already does.

Sara

    I don't know how many of the people who support a waiting period have
    actually seen the process a person goes through on choosing to have an
    abotion, and the counseling done in a clinic prior to the actual
    procedure.  
    
    Having been a volunteer for a local clinic, I have seen people sent
    home to think more on "Their" (no good plural for her), choice and
    options, because the counselor felt that the women involved were not
    making the choice, someone else was.  I have never seen any one in a
    clinic pressure a client into making a decision, just listing the
    options out, and explaining the procedure in graphic detail, showing
    the instruments used, etc.  The counselors explain the possible
    complications, and go over the consent form with the client.  They also
    suggest talking over the options with a trusted friend, since an
    unplanned pregnancy is a crisis.  I have never seen an abortion
    scheduled for the same day as a client comes in.  A pelvic, and an
    up-to-date pap and infection smear, as well as a positive pregnancy
    test are required, to make sure there aren't other problems that can
    look like a pregnancy or could threaten the health or life of the
    person involved.  
    
    For what it is worth, I oppose waiting periods for guns also.  I've
    seen what a gallon of gasoline and a butane lighter can do in the hands
    of a crazy person in terms of life changing destruction.  
    
    Meg

    I've been in the position of wanting an abortion, and having the man
    involved and his family be pretty violently pro-life.  (And I do mean
    violent.  He had sisters who participated in non-peaceful demonstrations.)
    
    Due to the circumstances of timing, I had to wait an additional week
    after I had *expected* to have the abortion.  That week caused a near
    nervous breakdown.  I was threatened with kidnapping, harrassed by
    phone calls in the middle of the night, yelled at, vilified and
    accosted in the street.  People that I felt had *no business* knowing
    about the situation were told and used to bring pressure to bear.  On
    the day of my appointment, I had "personal demonstrators" manning the
    picket line, and the clinic let me stay far past the normal recovery
    period because they were still there at what would have been my normal
    discharge time.  (Clinic workers told me the picketers stayed 3 hours 
    longer than "normal" that day.)  
    
    That kind of emotional pressure can also be exerted to convince a woman
    to abort who does not want to.  That level of pressure is simply wrong
    to me, regardless of which side is applying it.  I am completely
    unconvinced that extending the period when such pressure can be applied
    is beneficial to the woman making the decision, regardless of outcome. 
    At this point in the situation, all choices are bad -- and the truly
    loving thing is to present the choices and their consequences as
    clearly and calmly as possible, and then once the decision is made to
    leave it and go forward.
    
    And many thanks to all for the calm and reasoned tone of this
    discussion.  The topic is sensitive for me, and I appreciate the
    non-judgemental tone of all respondents.
    
    Alison

    
    The following is from a noter who wishes to remain anonymous
    
    -Jody
    
    ==============================================================
    
    Joyce, this may not make you feel any better but: pre-counseling is
    required prior to an abortion. If you cannot prove, to the satisfaction
    of your counselor, that you are having the abortion because you want
    it, and because you think it is the best thing for you, and not because
    of outside pressure alone, they themselves will refuse to do the
    abortion. On top of that, you have to sign a consent form to that
    affect. And they will pressure you not to sign it if they detect
    someone who is unsure.

    Because this is already in place, and because an official wait may push
    a woman out of the safe period for having an abortion at all, I think
    this legislation is horrible.   The women who are waffling have
    probably already delayed the process. Many women who have doubts will
    go through a huge denial, which jeopardizes their health and in fact
    also that of the fetus if they decide to keep it. Making them wait
    more, in my opinion is not only wrong, but also dangerous.

    Something else you may not be aware of: you cannot have an abortion
    safely until 7-8 weeks after your last period. Most women know that
    they are pregnant after 5-6 weeks, so there's already a built-in
    waiting period. After 12 weeks, it becomes less safe to abort. So, when
    you add a waiting period, you are causing more hassles than you seek to
    avoid.

    Since I am one of those women who thinks that bringing an unexpected,
    unwanted fetus to term is drastic and cruel to the girl or woman
    involved, and inherently wrong, I am trying to be sensitive to your
    reality, which leans more toward pro-life. But I hope that you will be
    informed about the process that is already in place, both medically,
    biologically, and psychologically, in clinics across the country,
    before you recommend something that I feel will do far more harm than
    good.  

    Please also consider that forcing a waiting period on women who have    
    made up their minds is the ultimate cruelty. I have been pregnant with
    an unwanted child. Going through morning sickness, and waves of nausea,
    fighting to find a way to sleep comfortably at night, watching your
    body change, trying not to throw up in front of classmates, teachers,
    peers and hordes of people who will probably not be the least bit
    sympathetic is something that a girl or woman deserves a right to put a
    stop to as soon as she's ready. Being pregnant when you don't want to
    be is an agony and hell that should not be prolonged by legislation.

                          

    We have our experience in our family...and I am trying to decide if I
    should tell it and I can't because the people involved could, might
    read this conference.
    
    I guess experience's vary in this.  An overzealous social worker and a
    ready, willing and able abortion clinic tried to influence someone very
    close to me.  We consider ourselves very fortunate that we did not
    allow the many negative conditions surrounding the conception of the
    child to follow through with the strong and persistant advice of the
    social worker.
    
    The child is beautiful, very smart, the parents happily married and
    financially secure.  
    
    At the same time and with the same social worker there is another
    story.  The young woman is a recovering alcoholic, has not been able to
    find suitable employment and is still in counselling.
    
    As I said initially we tend to examine issues with involved, enlightened
    intelligent people.  
    
    I appreciate the viewpoints against a waiting period.
    
    I personally, need to think about ways of resolving the issues that I
    have been close to around abortion.

    I didn't finish a thought....in the last reply.
    
    When I was younger I was on welfare.  I have had the privilege of
    experiencing life as a poor welfare recepient and as a middleclass
    career woman.  There were times in my life when it was difficult to
    make a decision, I wasn't equipped emotionally and I was quite
    dependent on others for not only sustanence but approval.  Although I
    was never in a situation that required me, personally to make this
    decision I did observe others in the predicament.  
    
    My age and my religion might be indicative of my value system, but I
    like it and feel it is right for me.  I would hope that I would choose
    the same system if I were twenty years younger.  
    
    The whole thing is getting confusing for me, which is perhaps the
    reason I never entered a note before on the subject.
    
    In summary I would want every woman to have control over her body. 
    Based on the experiences that have impacted my life I thought the
    waiting period was a good idea.
    

    re.220,.221
    
    Given your experiences, I can understand why you would be in
    favour of a waiting period.
    
    My own value and belief system is probably not so far from your own. I
    did not want children when I found myself to be pregnant early in my
    marriage.  My husband wanted children even less.  For us, abortion was
    not an option to be considered. No pressure from anyone. And, for as
    long as she lived, we dearly loved our daughter. No regrets.  Many
    people, knowing how we felt, asked why I didn't abort.  The answer was
    very simply because there was life for which I/we were responsible.  I
    didn't want/plan-to-have children, but _I_ felt it would be wrong to
    stop this life.
    
    I'm of the Homer Wells [ref. CIDER HOUSE RULES, John Irving] school of
    thought.  Regardless of how I personally choose to view abortion, it is
    a moral imperative for me to do my damnedest to keep the option open to
    women for as long as unwanted pregnancies occur, and allow them to
    choose for themselves -- without restriction, and with love and caring
    in my heart.
    
      Annie

  Disclaimer: The following note is not attempting to characterize
  Joyce's position.  I don't know how she feels about the "gag rules".

 -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

  I find it curious that the same polictical groups that:

    o Are in favor of a waiting period so that the affected woman
      can take the time to make a calm, rational, fully informed
      decision

    o Are *ALSO* opposed to telling poor women anything about
      abortion, it's availability as an option, or where those
      women could go to get such information.


  Calm, rational, and fully informed indeed!

                                   Atlant

    I was thinking about the things I said in this note today and I decided
    I should let it rest....it is a difficult issue for me to discuss
    because for me it has little to do with politics.
    
    And I don't have any answers.  I personally want the poor woman who is
    carrying an unwanted fetus to have the same opportunities that the rich
    woman has.
    
    But the poor woman that is carrying her child that was conceived at an
    inopportune time is a different story.  If she after searching her
    heart and soul feels that she must not have the child I support her.  
    But if she is willing to have the child I don't want her to be
    convinced that she is doing the 'best thing'.  
    
    In my thoughts today I came to the realization that this right is like
    a seesaw it is almost impossible to keep it balanced so that woman
    benefit from it.
    
    There is no real answer.  All I intended to do was point out that there
    are thousands that will weep for the rest of their lives over the
    children that could have been.
    
    All women no matter of their belief system should acknowledge that they
    are at risk in this matter.  The right could be taken away not only by
    not allowing abortion but by also legislating forced abortions.
    
    Our reproductive system has been the source of revenue for doctors and
    legislators since time began.  I feel that we have to be extremely
    diligent in protecting ourselves and our rights.  
    
    I believe that the politics of abortion have surfaced for a lot of
    reasons some of which may be the negative experiences I have discussed.
    Some of the legislation is a result of cost cutting measures and these
    two elements have given the moral majority a field day.
    
    Atlant, I don't like 'gag rules', I am very opposed to a class system,
    we are all equal and we should all have equal opportunities and rights.
    
    But I think I asked the question first, how to we help the woman who is
    being coerced into terminating the life of her unborn child.  How do we
    keep abortion clinics honest?
    
    And don't tell me that doctors and clinics wouldn't do something like
    that.  I was around when surgeons were ripping our insides out and
    many good and wise feminists lobbyed for legislation to insure that we
    were not coerced into unnecessary surgery!
    

    Joyce, thank you for your input in this note.  I know how difficult a
    topic this is for you.  I, more than you may realize, truly appreciate
    your responses.
    
    To me, your viewpoint is exactly what being pro-choice means to me.  I
    am not anti-life, I just think it is a woman's perogitive to choose
    what is right for her.  
    
    Again, thank you.  In a topic that can be acrimonious (to say the
    least!), you have maintained dignity and respect for others, while
    continuing to respect yourself.  
    
    E Grace

    Thank you E Grace.  I appreciate your support!
    
    J

>   Atlant, I don't like 'gag rules', I am very opposed to a class system,
>   we are all equal and we should all have equal opportunities and rights.
>
>   But I think I asked the question first, how to we help the woman who is
>   being coerced into terminating the life of her unborn child.  How do we
>   keep abortion clinics honest?

  I honestly don't worry about keeping "abortion clinics" (your words)
  honest.  I think the record of mainstream, legitimate, full-service
  reproductive services clinics (such as those run by Planned Parenthood)
  absolutely sparkles compared to the records of such groups as "Operation
  Rescue" and all those phony "pregnancy crisis hotlines" that are really
  just fronts for religious organizations.

  As to how to eliminate coercion within the family, I have no idea.
  But free and open access to *ALL* the accurate information in a timely
  fashion sounds like a good beginning to me, and this information should
  be available to all, regardless of whether they have the money to pay
  for it or not.

  BTW, you dislike the gag rules.  Are you actively working against them?

                                   Atlant

        re .227,
        
>>  But free and open access to *ALL* the accurate information in a timely
>>  fashion sounds like a good beginning to me, and this information should
>>  be available to all, regardless of whether they have the money to pay
>>  for it or not.
        
        It is so easy to toss out words like "should" without
        regard to the financial burden that it places on everyone
        else.  It takes resources to gather, research, and
        distribute that information.  You are free to devote
        yours to that end.  Others are free to choose not to. 
        
        The current administration could choose to spend some of
        the finite supply of federal tax dollars this way, or
        they could choose not to.  They have chosen not to.  The
        Supreme Court has ruled that there is nothing unconstitutional
        in saying "no."  The ruling probably didn't address
        whether it would also have been constitutional to decide
        "yes."
        
        Dan
        

    If we were to compare groups they should be like in structure and
    purpose.  Full service family planning centers are run by a
    professional staff, with a stable source of income and government
    funding.
    
    Crisis centers and hotlines are staffed by volunteers and are often
    part of a Christian Ministry.  
    
    

    The recent SCOTUS decision really brings home the point, often
    overlooked, that when you accept government money you accept
    the strings attached thereto. 
    
    Those who truly wish to see organizations such as Planned Parenthood
    free from such odious strings will take it upon themselves to fully
    *fund* same.
    
    (All of which ignores the question of *whether* it is a legitimate
    function of government to fund such organizations in the first place,
    but that's a discussion better left for other forums.)

Dan:

> The current administration could choose to spend some of
> the finite supply of federal tax dollars this way, or
> they could choose not to.  They have chosen not to.  The
> Supreme Court has ruled that there is nothing unconstitutional
> in saying "no."  The ruling probably didn't address
> whether it would also have been constitutional to decide
> "yes."

  That's really quite a mis-representation of what the ruling said.
  The ruling didn't say, for example, "You can't spend that portion
  of your budget which is provided by US federal funds on the dis-
  semination of information about abortion."  The ruling said "If
  you receive *ANY* US federal funds at all, you can't discuss
  abortion, even if that discussion is fully funded from sources
  other than US federal funds."

                                   Atlant

>     <<< Note 49.229 by AKOCOA::LAMOTTE "Join the AMC and 'Take a Hike'" >>>
>                                   -< A nit >-
>
> If we were to compare groups they should be like in structure and
> purpose.  Full service family planning centers are run by a
> professional staff, with a stable source of income and government
> funding.
>
> Crisis centers and hotlines are staffed by volunteers and are often
> part of a Christian Ministry.  
    
  Howe does that nit affect what I said?  Do "Crisis Pregnancy Centers"
  offer full information on all choices?  Are they low- or no-pressure
  groups that allow lots of time for careful reflection and consideration?

                                   Atlant

    One group is offering a service for which an individual is paying for
    the service and expecting to receive all the options.
    
    The other is a group that was organized to prevent something from
    occurring.  Suicide hotlines do not offer a full range of counseling
    for instance.  They are set up to prevent the suicide.  
    
    

    
    Then they should be called abortion prevention hotlines. Not pregnancy
    hotlines.

    
    By the way, I glanced in the yellow pages over the weekend and Abortion
    does have two headings. They then send you to Clinics and other things,
    but at least its in there.
    
    Now all we have to do is make sure its a word that every woman knows
    how to spell!
    
    I can see it now. "Hello, this is the XXX Family Planning Clinic, how
    can I help you?"
    
    "I need an abortion. Where can I find out about it?"
    
    "I'm sorry. We can't tell you that. If you'd like to talk about
    adoption..." CLICK.
    
    I just hope that women don't have to make but so many calls to get
    the right line. Some of the clinics actually have ads saying "WE DO
    ABORTIONS" I'd probably call them first.

    But in my real life example a person near and dear to me chose the
    wrong phone number in the book...because her crisis hot line sent her
    right to the abortion clinic.  She thought she was just asking for a
    free pregnancy test.
    
    And she was aggressively counselled to have an abortion.  
    
    

Joyce, that's a drag.

Ideally (ha), every woman who asks for counseling about birth/nobirth
/birthcontrol options should get the chance to talk to someone both 
disinterested personally in her outcome; and open to any and all choices that
will work for that woman.

I recently discouraged a relative from directly contacting a pregnant teen (who
is fleeing, in more ways than one, a disfunctional family situation) to try to
arrange an identified adoption.  My relative argued that she would be proposing
a wonderful solution for all -- this teen should clearly not be raising a baby
right now, and the adopters "would provide a stable and happy home" (we prove by
assertion, yes?), and everybody would be happy.  My contention is that though
my relative has all and only the best intentions -- I know this woman; although
her judgement is not always wise, her heart is always generous -- that it would
be wrong for her to pressure the teen in any direction, because my relative is
interested foremost NOT in what's best for the teen or baby, but in her
daughter's desperation to have a child.

sigh.  The teen's in a foster home now... and I wish the world was easier.

Sara

        re .231,
        
>>  That's really quite a mis-representation of what the ruling said.
>>  The ruling didn't say, for example, "You can't spend that portion
>>  of your budget which is provided by US federal funds on the dis-
>>  semination of information about abortion."  The ruling said "If
>>  you receive *ANY* US federal funds at all, you can't discuss
>>  abortion, even if that discussion is fully funded from sources
>>  other than US federal funds."
        
        A previous ruling was that a university receiving federal
        funds could not discriminate in its athletic program,
        even though the athletic program got its funding from
        elsewhere and did not use any of the federal funds. 
        Another previous ruling is that a school which received
        absolutely no federal funds at all was still required to
        obey the attached federal regulations, because some of
        their students applied for and received federal education
        funds.
        
        What possible grounds do you see for the Supreme Court to
        reverse precedent for this case and allow groups to take
        the money and ignore the attached rules?
        
        Dan

Dan:

> What possible grounds do you see for the Supreme Court to
> reverse precedent for this case and allow groups to take
> the money and ignore the attached rules?

  Only that in those cases you cited, the government rules *PROMOTED*
  the aims of the United States Constitution (equal protection, etc.)
  and in this case, the government rules clearly stand in the way of
  the aims of the Constitution (the right to free speech, the estab-
  lishment clause, etc.)

                                   Atlant

    Joyce -
    
    Truly, I am sorrowed to hear of the experience within your family. 
    I've been through the agony of unwanted pregnancy more than once 
    within my own family, with the first instance in 1972 (pre Roe v.
    Wade), once in 1973 (post Roe v. Wade), once in 1990, and a couple of
    other times, and in several different states.  I won't go into all of
    the outcomes, as it isn't appropriate.  I will state that the level of
    counseling available, its "flavor" and compassion, changed
    significantly between 1973 and 1990.  In '73, the clinic was so glad
    that they had the abortion option to offer, that other options got very
    short shrift.  In 1990, all options, from abortion through traditional
    adoption to identified adoption to single parenting were presented,
    with both long and short term consequences to the mother, potential
    child, father, and extended family were presented.  For those
    interested, the 1990 experience was through Planned Parenthood, and
    included an offer of counseling for the potential father (which he
    refused).
    
    Bad things do happen.  Not all in the counseling professions are as
    objective as we might wish.  May each of us find peace as we struggle
    with the best ways to resolve life-changing decisions.
    
    Alison
    
    

    The situation in .237 worked out well which I have alluded to in
    another note.  I have already said far more than I should have about
    this situation.  
    
    I want to thank you for the support in this note and in mail.  I am
    going to bow out of the discussion as I really don't have much more to
    offer.
    
    I pray that someday there will be peace and all people young and old
    will be loved and cared for.  As grieved as I am that some children
    cannot be born, I will continue to devote my time to the elderly who
    are here and are in someways aborted from society and put in their
    holding cells till their body stops functioning.
    
    

        re .240,
        
>>  and in this case, the government rules clearly stand in the way of
>>  the aims of the Constitution (the right to free speech, the estab-
>>  lishment clause, etc.)
        
        Obviously I disagree.  There was no additional limitation
        placed on anything that anyone could say outside the
        workings of the organization receiving federal funds. 
        Religion is not even mentioned.
        
        To get federal funds, they can ask you to give up your
        soul.  And they can take away all the money so that you
        have to ask.  Think about it.
        
        Dan

    Consider this.  At this point in time, a woman in America has a legal
    right to a safe abortion (at least until the Supreme Court decides 
    otherwise).
    
    What this ruling states is that a federally funded clinic MUST NOT
    advise you of your legal rights, EVEN IF YOU ASK SPECIFICALLY.  Now
    isn't that an interesting concept, ladies and gentlemen.  Sort of makes
    you wonder how long the Miranda ruling will last (*), especially given
    the recent ruling on coerced confessions.
    
    Couple this with the majority opinion that it is not the Court but
    poverty that prevents certain women from receiving full and correct
    information; and you wonder whether the legal/political system in this
    great country is completely out to lunch.
    
    					Nigel
    
    (*) Note:  The Miranda ruling makes it obligatory for an arresting
    officer to fully advise the arrestee of hir rights, including the right
    to legal representation, and to make sure that the arrestee
    understands. It is one of the present cornerstones of the American
    justice system.
    

    
    Nigel, I always love your notes.
    
    Carla
    

Article 15145 of alt.activism:
Path: nntpd.lkg.dec.com!news.crl.dec.com!deccrl!decwrl!ucbvax!CABOT.DARTMOUTH.EDU!harelb
From: harelb@CABOT.DARTMOUTH.EDU (Harel Barzilai)
Newsgroups: alt.activism,soc.women
Subject: Supreme Court ALERT (Planned Parenthood / NOW)
Message-ID: <9106050518.AA07794@cabot.dartmouth.edu>
Date: 5 Jun 91 05:18:39 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
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	[This PeaceNet ALERT will be re-posted to
	misc.activism.progressive scehduled to start very soon]

 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 
Topic 49        Urgent Appeal*Abortions*Supreme Crt 
peacenet        pn.alerts        4:23 pm  Jun  4, 1991 
 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 
Subject: Urgent Appeal*Abortions*Supreme Crt 
 
From ckruger Tue Jun  4 09:08 PDT 1991 
 
With the recent Supreme Court decision in Rust v. Sullivan, 
prohibiting doctors in Federally funded family planning clinics 
from discussing abortion with their patients, Planned Parenthood 
Federation of America, and the National Organization for Women 
have begun campaigns to overturn the ruling through the passage 
of two bills currently in Congress.  The bills are "The Title X 
Pregnancy Counseling Act" and "The Freedom of Choice Act". 
 
It is imperative that all of us who believe in the right to 
choose and control our bodies support these campaigns both with 
our activism as well as financially!  In addition Planned 
Parenthood has indicated they may try to completely forgo Federal 
funding at their clinics.  If they do, they will need our 
grassroots support to find new sources of funding, so they may 
continue to offer family planning services (including abortion 
counseling) to all women - especially poor and impoverished 
women. 
 
The following is an excerpt from an urgent appeal issued by NOW, 
followed by the addresses of both NOW and Planned Parenthood: 
 
                         ****** 
 
The National Organization for Women has launched an EMERGENCY 
MOBILIZATION TO SAVE ABORTION RIGHTS that "targets two critical 
pieces of Federal legislation -- The Title X Pregnancy Counseling 
Act that requires clinics to give women COMPLETE and ACCURATE 
information about abortion ... and The Freedom of Choice Act that 
provides women in every state with the ROE v. WADE guarantee 
regardless of what courts or state legislatures do. 
 
Our EMERGENCY MOBILIZATION TO SAVE ABORTION RIGHTS has four key 
steps: 
 
 
 
     FIRST, we're calling on all NOW activists to organize 
     demonstrations, pickets and other DIRECT ACTIONS at 
     Congressional offices around the country demanding 
     passage of these crucial Federal bills. 
 
     SECOND, we're gearing up our activists and 
     supporters for a massive, grassroots IN-DISTRICT 
     LOBBYING AND ACTION CAMPAIGN on Senators and members of 
     Congress when they are home during the July break. 
 
     THIRD, we're reactivating our PHONE BANKS in cities 
     and communities all across the country to enlist help 
     in this all-out effort from the hundreds of thousands 
     of activists who marched and rallied for abortion 
     rights in Washington D.C in 1989. 
 
     FOURTH, We're flooding the office of House Speaker Tom 
     Foley with POST CARDS (available from NOW) FROM VOTERS 
     demanding that The Title X Pregnancy Counseling Act be 
     scheduled for a vote immediately -- before the July 
     break! 
 
                              ****** 
 
To contribute or find out how you can help, contact your local 
chapter of NOW, or Planned Parenthood, or at their national 
offices listed below:  
 
     Planned Parenthood Federation of America 
     810 Seventh Avenue 
     P.O. Box 4447                 Phone: (212) 541-7800 
     New York, NY  10164-0359 
 
     National Organization for Women 
     1000 16th Street, N.W. 
     P.O. Box 96825                Phone: (202) 331-0066 
     Washington, D.C.  20036 
 
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     	BATON ROUGE, La. (UPI) -- The Louisiana Legislature overrode Gov.
    Buddy Roemer's veto and passed into law Tuesday one of the strictest
    anti-abortion measures in the United States.
        The bill outlaws all abortions except in cases of rape and
    incest, when saving the life of the mother. It sets prison sentences
    of up to 10 years for doctors who perform illegal abortions. There is 
    no provision for self-abortion in the law.
     	In his veto message last Friday, Roemer said the measure ``dishonors
    women, shows great mistrust of doctors and their professional judgment
    and unduly burdens the traumatized victims of rape.''
    

    
    
    I thought that it was still illegal even in most cases of rape.
    

  Abortion after a rape is only legal if the rape is reported
  within one week of occurence;

  Abortion after incest is only legal if the incest is reported
  within 13 weeks of occurence.

  The principal sponsor of the now-successful bill says that he's
  going to go back and try to get ammendments passed that will
  close these loopholes.

                                   Atlant

    
    FYI.. following is an editorial from today's New York Times, reprinted
    w/o permission.
    
                     In Louisiana: Law? No. Cruelty.
    
    Those who describe Louisiana's new abortion law as "tough" or "one of
    the nation's most restrictive" don't do justice to its crude cruelty. 
    This law strips women of their dignity and their rights.  Even its
    exceptions are deceptive traps.
    
    Gov. Buddy Roemer was courageous to veto the bill, the third time in
    two years he has done so.  This time the State Legislature, unwilling
    to save itself from ignominy, has overridden the veto.
    
    Courts will surely enjoin the law's operation until Louisiana can
    appeal as high as the Supreme Court.  But if this law turns out to be
    the vehicle for re-examining Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision
    safe-guarding a woman's freedom to control her reproductive life, it
    will give the Court a view of the anti-choice movement at its most
    vindictive.
    
    Doctors who perform abortions, and friends or counselors who facilitate
    them, would be jailed at least one year and fined $10,000, with
    maximums up to 10 years and $100,000.  The Legislature made a vague
    exception for abortions to save a woman's life.  There are also nominal
    exceptions for rape and incest, but they contain the real traps.
    
    To qualify for an abortion, and keep her doctor out of prison, a rape
    victim would have to be swift, smart and lucky.  Within five days of
    the rape, the law says, she must get a different doctor to examine her
    and certify that she was not pregnant before the crime.  She must
    report the crime to law enforcement authorities within seven days, even
    though that's obviously too early for her to know whether she has
    become pregnant.
    
    It's a sadistic extra penalty inflicted by Louisiana.  What other
    description befits giving victims so little time to decide whether to
    undergo the added trauma of official reporting and police
    cross-examination?  Why such savagery?  Because the pro-life
    legislators are convinced that women lie about such matters.
    
    Governor Roemer, who once had a pro-life record, has been pushed so
    relentlessly by extremists that ultimately he pushed back, calling for
    at least a reasonable reporting period.  Now he rightly concludes that
    the new abortion law "degrades women."
    
    Some legislators want to go still further and nullify even the rape and
    incest exceptions.  That would frame the case for choice in its
    starkest form, with the state asserting dogma disguised as law to deny
    some women their most personal liberty.
    
    With all its rape-incest technicalities and serpentine procedures,
    Louisiana's new law blazes with contempt for women's liberty.  If the
    Supreme Court wants to meddle further with Roe v. Wade, here's a law
    that could at least force the justices to look ugliness right in the
    eye.
    
    

    A few weeks ago, NH NOW had an action to call attention to Rust v.
    Sullivan.  After that action, there were a couple of letters to the
    editor in the Nashua Telegraph.  I wrote this letter in reply. 
    
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    
          Dear Editor,

          The recent letter to the editor by Richard White at-
          tacked Atlant Schmidt and me on a variety of topics.
          Since I am confined by space considerations, I will
          limit this letter to rebutting a few of his points.

          White states that being pro-choice is like the fox
          being pro-chicken. However, you can be both pro-choice
          and pro-child. The anti-choice movement has attempted
          to imply that pro-choice proponents have no children
          and don't want anyone to have any. This is an out and
          out falsehood.

          There are 12 people on the board of the NH chapter of
          the National Organization for Women. Of those 12, 10
          have children or are pregnant right now. We believe
          that women who want their children make better mothers.
          We don't want to force motherhood on anyone who doesn't
          want to be one. We just don't judge a woman who decides
          that abortion is the way that she will avoid this
          state. And Mr. White, pregnancy is not always about
          women "being sufficiently liberated to take control of
          their conduct..." Sometimes it's as a result of rape,
          incest, or failed birth control.

          NOW is not a single-issue organization. We see the
          complexities of many issues and how the issues are
          interrelated. We care about children after they are
          born. We lobby for funding to make sure that poor
          women who do want their children have enough money
          to adequately care for them. We work to ensure that
          parental leave is a right extended to all after the
          birth of a child or when a child is ill. We are trying
          to gain equality for women at every level, for example,
          so we make equal pay as men, and in this way a child
          will benefit too. We are actively concerned about the
          environment so that resources will still be available
          to our children and grandchildren. We donated car seats
          to several police stations after a law went into effect
          that forced them to transport women and their children
          to safe houses to avoid a batterer. I believe all of
          these issues prove that we are pro-child. What have you
          done lately, Mr. White?

          In my attempt to discuss David Mosher's sign "Kill Them
          All N.O.W.," I described this as tasteless. Perhaps
          a better word is ironic. The sight of seeing a self-
          professed pro-life activist (who also happened to be a
          male) hold this sign above four women, one of whom was
          8 months pregnant, and another who was holding a baby,
          summed it all up to me.

                                             Sincerely,
    
                                             Judy Blachek
                                             President of NH NOW

    
    re .251
    
    Well written!  
    
    Jamd

    re: .251
    
    WOW!  JUDY!  YES!
    
    THANK YOU!
    
    Nancy

    
The following passage about the history of abortion is from the article
"Abortion" in Barbara Walker's book The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and
Secrets: 

"Abortion
 --------

	"The ancients generally viewed abortion as a woman's private 
business, in which no man had any right to interfere. As [C. G.] Hartley
put it, 'Each woman must be free to make her own choice; no man may safely
decide for her; she must give life gladly to be able to give it well.' But
with the rise of patriarchal religions -- especially among the Greeks --
came a belief that a father's semen conveyed the soul to the fetus. Men
feared for the safety of any of their body effluvia (hair cuttings,
fingernail clippings, spittle, blood) lest sorcery might damage the living
man by damaging what was once a part of him. The fear was particularly
pronounced in the case of semen as an extension of the father's soul. St.
Thomas Aquinas held this same opinion, since he asserted that semen was the
vehicle of souls. It was a logical extension of this notion that abortion
should be outlawed, not because it was dangerous to women, but because it
was thought (magically) dangerous to men. 

	"In the east, however, abortion was perfectly legal at any time 
before the fifth month, when 'quickening' was felt. After that, according 
to Brahman scriptures, a woman who destroyed her fetus was held guilty of 
murder, but before that time the fetus was soulless and could be destroyed 
with impunity. This opinion was embodied in the Catholic church's Doctrine 
of Passive Conception, which contradicted Aquinas in order to prove that 
the soul comes only from God. Up to the late 19th century, the Doctrine of 
Passive Conception declared that the soul arrives in the fifth month of 
pregnancy, to quicken the fetus, which was previously soulless.

	"In 1869 the church again revised its opinion, tacitly admitting 
either that God had misinformed his church about his method of instilling 
the soul into the body, or else that he had decided to alter it. Pope Pius 
X announced that the soul was received at conception after all.

	"Actually, the church was only coming around, several decades late, 
to follow some new laws made by man, not by God. Abortion was not 
classified as a crime in Europe until the 19th century. The United States 
first defined abortion as a criminal offense in the year 1830. 

	"The church now falsely pretends that it officially 'always' 
opposed abortion. The medieval church's ire was aroused not by abortions per 
se but by the midwives who performed them. The handbook of the Inquisition 
stated: 'No one does more harm to the Catholic faith than midwives'...The 
church was not averse to killing the unborn, since it burned many pregnant 
women as witches. Even the pregnant wife of a city councillor was tortured 
and burned at Bamberg in 1630.

	"Recent opposition to legalization of abortion apparently stemmed 
from ignorance of how recently it was illegalized; and also from male 
belief that women must be controlled by forcing childbirth on them. 'Male 
legislators have laughed at the idea of the legalization of abortion, 
hinting at unprecedented promiscuity (on the part of women, not men) if 
such a thing were allowed. Meanwhile, thousands of desperate women die each 
year as the direct result of male laws making abortion illegal. Women are 
learning the meaning of this male laughter and indifference in the face of 
the most hazardous and serious biological enterprise women undertake,
willingly or not.'" 

    Dorian,
    
    Luker's book Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood, gives the
    same history of the legal status of abortion. She also points
    out that in the United States the laws against abortion were part
    of a campaign by doctors to out law healers - such as midwives -
    that had not graduated from medical colleges. The fact that they
    had a much lower death rate for childbirth (because they were
    cleaner) not withstanding. 
    
    (Interestingly enough a lot of the practices that got women banned
    as witches were related to knowlege of herbal medications and
    cleanliness.)
    
    Bonnie

    Nat Hentoff has written a series of articles in the
    Village Voice over the last few weeks, in which he
    states that feminist leaders (especially those in
    NARAL) deliberately downplay the number of unsafe
    abortions (and the resulting deaths of women)
    that occur each year.  He produces quotes to the
    effect that those leaders fear that any bad publicity
    about unsafe (though legal) abortions will lead to 
    more legislation banning abortion.
    
    Hentoff claims that many women die needlessly because
    of lack of proper regulation of abortion clinics.
    Hentoff has written against legalized abortion in
    the past, but here he states that as long as it is 
    legal, it should be safe.   He based his articles in
    part on work done by a woman reporter for a (I think)
    Florida newspaper.
    
    
    /bruce

>>>            <<< Note 49.256 by ZENDIA::LARU "goin' to Graceland" >>>
>>>                              -< unsafe clinics? >-

this has also been a concern in several bay area publications in the last
few years, as well as reports on PBS and network news.  It is hardly new.
It is true that if an abortion clinic is not staffed with competent medical
staff, it is unsafe...and the clinics are not monitored for safety as they
should be.  Why? Well, it has crossed my mind that the reason no government
agency is concerned with safety in these clinics might have something to do
with the fact that government in this country is controlled by men...and
the men in control don't care.  Perhaps their concern would be greater if
the women who are reported to use abortion clinics were all upper-middle
and high income WASP women?

One fact that these articles/news reports do NOT seem to mention...a woman is 
statistically safer having an (safe) abortion than carrying a pregnancy to
term and delivering a baby.  Pregnancy is fraught with medical challenges
to the woman's body, many of which can be lethal.  This is a statistical
fact.  Even the AMA admits it.  Even C. Everett Koop admits it...and he
made President Reagan very unhappy when he did.

Simply put, if the clinics are well-run, abortion is physically safer
than continued pregnancy.

    - .1
    
    <set utter amazement on>
    
    You mean pregnancy is *dangerous*? People have *died*?!
    
    -- then how come we don't erect memorials to people who've gone through it,
    kind of like, you know, the way we do to people who've braved dangers
    and/or died in, let us say, for the sake of argument here...war?
    
    Dorian
    
    <back to ho hum>                                               

    But we do - Mother's Day, which greatly benefits card printers,
    florists, and the nicer restaurants.

    - .1
    
    Well shoot, Mother's Day, that's right too. How *could* I have
    forgotten?!
    
    Now, if only they'd erect a giant a Hallmark card next to the Minuteman
    monument on the Lexington Green... 
    
    Dorian

    re .Dorian, well, I don't know about you, but I've always gotten the
    impression that most men think going to war is much more important than
    having babies, which is kind of silly because without babies who
    eventually grow-up to be soldiers there could be no war!  I think
    monuments are erected to people who die in war as a show of force. 
    It's a way for some men to show other men that they are powerful, and
    having power over others seems to be very important to some men.  
    
    How can simply dying while having a baby begin to compete with dying
    while trying to show other men that they are not as powerful as you?
    Come on, Dorian, be real.
    
    Lorna
    

    First of all, let's get our terminology straight.  A woman who dies
    during pregnancy is an example of "collateral birthing damage".  Like
    all forms of collateral damage (such as that which occurs during the
    carpet bombing of Third World nations), it is no more than a necessary
    element of overall strategic goals, and hardly warrants anything so
    dramatic as a statue.  To erect a statue would only serve to diminish
    the morale of potential birthing personnel (in laymen's terms,
    "women"), and would detract from the overall effort required to produce
    new oil consumers into the twentieth century (an absolute necessity if
    we are going to be able to justify any more Middle Eastern wars).

    -- Mike

    
    Oh darn, Lorna, you mean women's blood isn't as good as men's?
    
    Dorian

    phreoow!  and I thought *I* was sarcastic...Dorian, Lorna, you just
    broke the meter!
    
    Oh, and Dorian, don't you remember in a patriarchal society body
    boundaries *have* to be maintained except in sex (which is, of course,
    a necessary evil) and in warfare (when it is a *virtue* to let your
    bodily fluids spill)?
    
    So *of course* dying in childbirth is ignoble!
    
    \D/

    I believe there's a rathole topic around somewhere...

    I moved Nick's note to the rathole since he was only responding to the
    part of Mike's note that had nothing to do with abortion concerns.
    I think death during labor is related to this issue, so I'm leaving
    those replies, but let's not get too far afield.  
    
    Justine - Womannotes comod

    There was a piece on the NPR last night about a World Health Watch
    report on Women's Reproductive Health. This is what I remember
    about it. Can anyone expand on or correct what I've written?
    
    _____________________________________________________________
    
    What I heard indicated that the U.S. ban on funding any organization
    that has anything to do with abortion (giving abortions with non
    related funds, counceling about abortion, ditto, keeping statistics
    on abortion, or helping women who had had botched abortions elsewhere
    are all banned) had actually increased the abortion and infant and
    mother death rate abroad in developing countries.
    
    The reasons for this were apparently twofold:
    
    1. U.S. funds had been the major support of many of these clinics.
       Without them medical care and free or low cost contraceptive
       availability were seriously reduced. (In some countries where
       abortion was legal, US funds were used for medical and contraceptive
       purposes, and funds from other sources for anything related to
       abortions but this is not acceptable to the US.)
    
       As a result more women have turned to abortion (often by ill
       educated midwives and local healers) with a resultant increase
       in infections and deaths from unhygenic abortions.
    
    2. In many countries the brunt of the national health care programs
       is focused on the cities (India was the example used.) The funds
       from the U.S. had often been focused on rural health organizations.
       One of the things that these organizations did was to train rural
       midwives in hygene  - cutting the cord with a sterile blade not
       a shard of glass or a razor, hand washing before reaching into
       the vaginal cavity, etc. These midwives also performed abortions
       by traditional medthods (a stick pushed through the cervix) which  
       were frequently lethal.
    
       The discontinuance of funds meant not only a discontinuance
       of the training programs for these women, but in the absence
       of alternatives a greater reliance on them for maternal care.
    
       BJ

    Bonnie Jean,
    
    I read an article in the Denver Post Contemporary Magazine by Dotti
    Lamm last night that chilled me.  Over 200,000 women die each year
    world wide from illeagal and unhygenic abortions.  Infections,
    hemorages and perforated uteruses (uteri) abound using some of the 
    traditional methods.  I'll try and bring in the article.
    
    Meg

    -.1
    
    Interesting that you should use Brr!
    
    At the National NOW convention, a speaker from NY who is running for
    Senate said that we are indeed in a chilling time for women.  
    Brr!= the Bush, Reagan, Renquist court that will bring a chill to women
    for a long time to come.
    
    judy

    
    > a speaker from NY who is running for Senate 
    
    Do you remember the name?  If not, if I gave you names to choose from
    would that help?  Was it a male or female?
    
    Thanks,
    Phyllis
    

    Posted with the permission of the sender....  (header at bottom) 
    ***************************************************************

[reproduced without permission (and with my typos) from Scientific American]
                                                        *******************
EXPORTING MISERY

A U.S. abortion ruling affects women's health worldwide

     On May 23 the U.S.  Supreme Court upheld Title X regulations issued by
the Reagan administration in 1988 that prohibit federally funded family-
planning clinics from providing women with any information about abortion. 
The decision, which came on a 5-4 vote, provoked extensive media coverage,
brought satisfaction to antiabortion advocates and outraged pro-choice groups
and their supporters.

     Only 11 days later the Supreme Court quietly issued another abortion-
related decision that, while provoking relatively little public comment, has
even more far-reaching consequences.  The ruling, which was issued by the
high court without comment, sanctions another Reagan policy that exports the
gag order on abortion to developing countries.

     Called the Mexico City policy because it was announced at a family-
planning conference in Mexico City in 1984, the rule denies U.S. foreign aid
to any organization that performs abortion, advises women on abortion or
lobbies on behalf of abortion rights - even if these activities are supported
by non-U.S. funds.  Like Title X regulations, the Mexico City policy was
challenged in court by the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

     Antiabortion groups, whose lobbying helped to bring about the Mexico
City policy, have nothing but praise for the court's decision.  Richard
Doerflinger, a spokesperson for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops,
calls it "good common sense and good morality." He contends that the policy
has helped decrease the number of unintended pregnancies and promote "true
family planning" in developing countries.

     That view cannot be further from the truth, according to family-planning
experts.  Sally J. Patterson, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood, contends
that the Mexico City policy may actually have led to a rise in the number of
unintended pregnancies and abortions in the Third World by reducing the
availability of other forms of contraception.  "We suspect," she adds, that
the policy has caused "an increase in the number of women dying from unsafe
abortions."

     The policy has denied U.S. funds to many international organizations -
notably Planned Parenthood, which was once the largest recipient of U.S. 
money - that off contraception as well as abortion-related services.  Some
funds have been diverted to groups opposed not only to abortion but to all
forms of artificial contraception.  The Agency of International Development
(AID), the primary dispenser of U.S. foreign aid, recently provided a
$200,000 grant to a Catholic organization that advocates the rhythm method
and sexual abstinence as the best forms of birth control.  The money will be
spent in Zambia - a county with a soaring rate of AIDS.

     AID once led the world in promoting birth control, including abortion,
in developing nations.  Adrienne Germain of the International Women's Health
Coalition, a group based in New York City that supports medical and
reproductive services in Third World countries, observes that in the 1960s
and early 1970s AID helped to develop a simple abortion procedure for health
care providers with limited training and resources.  "It is the ulitmate in
appropriate technology," Germain says.

     The Reagan and Bush administrations cut AID's annual budget for family
planning from a high of $300 million in 1985 to $270 million in 1990. 
Meanwhile pressure from conservative groups has helped shut down research
that could provide alternatives to abortion in developing and advanced
nations alike.

     Other nations have taken up some of the slack.  France, for example, is
promoting the use of the chemical abortifacient RU 486 in developing
countries.  But these nations, like the U.S., are increasingly constrained by
pressure from antiabortion groups.  No other country, moreover, can match the
financial and scientific porential of the U.S.  "If you cut back on U.S. 
research," Germain says, "you're cutting it off at the source."

     Not surprisingly, birth control remains largely unpracticed in many
nations.  A report by Jodi L. Jacobson of the Worldwatch Institute, a
research group in Washington, D.C., concludes that 50 to 60 percent of
couples in Latin America, 60 to 80 percent in low-income Asian nations (China
excepted), 75 percent in the Middle East and North Africa, and 90 percent in
sub-Saharan Africa do not use any form of modern contraception.  Yet most
couples on Latin America and Asia and a growing percentage on the Middle East
and Africa, Jacobson says, "wish to space the timing or limit the number of
their children."

     The inevitable result of these trends is that more women are turning to
unqualified abortion practitioners or trying to abort themselves.  According
to Jacobson, abortion-related deaths are rising throughout Asia (China
excepted) and Africa.  Such deaths now account for 31 percent of all recorded
maternal deaths in Bangladesh and 25 percent in Ethiopia.  In six Latin
American countries, Jacobson adds, unsafe abortion is already the leading
killer of women in their twenties and thirties and the second leading cause
in another six.  The World Health Organization has estimated that some
200,000 women die every year of complications from improper abortions.

     These estimates may even be low.  According to a 1988 study by the
Population Crisis Committee (PCC), a private group in Washington, D.C., the
Mexico City policy has discouraged U.S.-funded clinics from reporting
abortions, legal or otherwise.  Some clinics have expunged any records of
abortion-related treatment from their files out of fear that they could
endanger their U.S. funding.

     For the same reason, clinics have refused to treat women suffering from
botched abortions.  A worker at a clinic in Bangladesh told PCC researchers
that even if a woman showed up bleeding and in severe pain, she would be
turned away without treatment or even advice.  "We can't touch abortion," the
worker said.

     Technically, the Mexico City policy applies only to private groups and
not to state-run hospitals and clinics.  Yet PCC vice president Sharon L.
Camp says the policy has led some governments dependent on U.S. foreign aid
to limit or to eliminate abortion-related services - even if their own laws
permit the procedure.  Camp recalls asking a health official in Kenya, where
abortion is officially legal for some health indications, why his agency was
acting as if it were subject to the Mexico City policy.  "One does not bite
the hand...," the official replied.

     Now that the Supreme Court has upheld the Mexico City policy, family-
planning groups are lobbying the U.S. Congress to reverse the policy through
legislation.  Representatives Olympia J. Snowe of Maine and Chester Atkins
of Massachusetts have co-sponsored such legislation, which was passed by the
House on June 12.  But Senator Jesse A. Helms of North Carolina has
predicted that the Senate will not follow suit.

     Carol A. Miller, a member of Snowe's staff, points out that an
appropriations bill could still overturn the Mexico City policy, although
President Bush might then use his power of veto.  Still, Miller notes that
opponents of the policy have a trump card: the outrage of many Americans over
the gag rule placed on U.S. clinics.  "We hope that will carry over" into
the struggle for the rights of women in the Third World, Miller says.

								-John Horgan

From:	STAR::PRAETORIUS "RAMtron: we put the FRAM in your framistat  14-Jul-1991 1238" 14-JUL-1991 12:59:44.59
To:	RANGER::JCAMPBELL,LJOHUB::GONZALEZ
CC:	
Subj:	gee, I didn't catch this on the nightly news. . .
    

    Margaret
    
    This was the material I reported on a few notes back that I'd heard
    on NPR last week.
    
    Bonnie

    The name of the woman running for Senate in NY is Elizabeth Holtzman. 
    Currently, she is the comptroller of New York City.
    
    judy

    
    re .274:
    
    Fascinating, Judy.  I remember voting for her in 1980 when
    she ran for the Senate and lost.  (That's when I last lived
    and voted in NY state).
    
    I hope she gets it this time.
    
    I didn't know she was comptroller in NYC.  Right after she lost
    the election in 1980, she took over as District Attorney in NYC.
    

    
    
    Articles sent to me by a friend over recent court antics
    =============================================================
    
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:44:43
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article GFL
To: choice
 
"Good for the Left, Now Good for the Right", NEWSWEEK, July 8 edition
excerpt from article talking about judicial politics
 
...In the term's most controversial decision, Rust v. Sullivan, the court by a
5-4 vote upheld federal regulations barring all discussion of abortion in
family-planning clinics that receive government money.  Doctors had no
free-speech rights to advise patients.  The regulations, authorized by a 1970
act of Congress, were issued in 1988 by the Reagan administration.  They
represented a 180-degree change in rules that had been in effect for the prior
18 years that required clinic employees to provide abortion information. 
While the Supreme Court acknowledged the ambiguity of the 1970
legislation-normally enough to strike down the regulations subsequently
passed-it nonetheless went on to consider the constitutional question.  That
was more than even O'Connor could stand.  Dissenting, she scolded her brethren
for violating "a fundamental rule of judicial restraint."
	Rehnquist, who wrote the Rust opinion in May, justified it on the
ground that administrative agencies deserve deference when statutes are
ambiguous.  Yet, two months earlier, Rehnquist refused to defer to a different
agency in a case about the application of U.S. antidiscrimination law
overseas.  "Both these decisions can't be right," says Duke University law
professor Walter Dellinger.  "This court has abandoned any pretense of
neutrality."
	Against that backdrop, the departure of Thurgood Marshall is of more
symbolic meaning than anything else.  The last, great liberal on the bench is
gone.  In terms of results, it doesn't matter much.  The conservatives-average
age, 60-own the farm, and the ideological horses are already out of the barn. 
Marshall seemed to recognize as much when, in his Payne dissent, he offered a
list of endangered precedents "now ripe for reconsideration" by the emboldened
court, including those which approved minority set-asides for government
contractors, the exclusion of insane murderers from execution, the bar on
govt. aid to parochial schools, and, of course, Roe v. Wade.  All that really
happens, then, when Marshall is replaced by someone more conservative is that
the Rehnquist bloc will pick up more steam.
	That's a lot for the liberals to lament.  But it's hard to be
sympathetic.  Thirty years ago it was their turn to bask in the glow of
judicial activism, Warren style.  In that era, the majority justices would
peer into the Constitution and create new rights, without answering
conservative critics who demanded to know the legitimate sources for their
unprecedented forays.  "One of the saddest lessons of recent decades," says
Gunther, "is that judges have given up their explaining function because they
just don't believe in it.  It's only the result that matters."...
 
The Eight Thurgood Leaves Behind
William Rehnquist (age 66): Nixon's revenge.  Leader of the counterrevolution.
Harry Blackmun (age 82): Last of the liberals.  Desperately wants to preserve
Roe v. Wade.
Anthony Kennedy (age 54): The most obscure justice, the fellow in Bork's seat. 
A reliable member of the Rehnquist bloc.
Sandra Day O'Connor (age 61): A centrist, if such a thing exists anymore.  Roe
may yet rest in her hands.
Antonin Scalia (age 55): Rashomon of the Constitution; to the liberals, he's
the Prince of Darkness, to conservatives, he's the deity.
David Souter (age 51): So much for the Stealth nominee.  O'Connor in a
three-piece suit.
John Paul Stevens (age 71): A strong Marshall ally recently, but still the
court maverick.
Byron White (age 74): Senior in tenure, and the only justice named by a
Democrat.
 
by
David Kaplan and Bob Cohn
 
	  
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:43:08
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article HFR
To: choice
 
 
"How Far Right?"  from NEWSWEEK, July 8, 1991 edition
 
	When George Bush heard the news that Thurgood Marshall had resigned
from the Supreme Court last week, the president did not exactly jump for joy. 
He did not cry "Eureka! A victory for the unborn!" or "Thank goodness, now we
can lock up those criminals!"  Instead, Bush responded cautiously and rather
tepidly, "That's very interesting."
	The president was wise to temper his enthusiasm.  The chance to
replace a legendary liberal on the high court is a mixed blessing, even for a
conservative chief executive.  True, Justice Marshall was one of the principal
architects of a judicial edifice that Republican presidents have been trying
to dismantle for the past two decades.  On the court, Marshall was a powerful
voice and vote against the death penalty, against prayer in schools, for
mandatory busing of schoolchildren, for greater rights for the criminally
accused.  He believed that freedom of speech, no matter how distasteful, was
nearly absolute and he never met an affirmative-action program he didn't like. 
By replacing Marshall with a conservative, Bush has an opportunity to complete
a counterrevolution, to end one era on the Supreme Court and begin another.
	But the change must be carefully calibrated.  What if the court does
not stop where it is-somewhere to the right of center, but still safely in the
mainstream of popular mores and attitudes?  Will Americans still be applauding
(and voting GOP) is the court keeps on moving to the right-if it severly
restricts abortions, abandons the rights of minorities and women, and gives
the other branches of government license to do pretty much whatever they
please, all under the mantle of "judicial restraint"?
	Bush, the political pragmatist, knows the risks to himself and his
party.  According to White House aides, he had no interest in finding a rabid
right-winger to fill Marshall's seat.  One obvious candidate (ed. note; who
has since officially been nominated) was Judge Clarence Thomas of the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.  Like Marshall, Thomas, 43, is
and African-American.  His race set up a Capitol irony: Bush, the avowed foe
of quotas, trying to fill the "black seat" on the court.  But his advisers
were more worried that Thomas would be attacked for lack of experience (he has
been on the bench for only 16 months).  Others warned that the former head of
the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, who opposed most
affirmative-action plans, would be branded as a turncoat by civil-rights
groups.  For his part, Marshall counseled the president that race should not
be used as "an excuse for doing wrong... picking the wrong Negro and saying
'I'm picking him because he's a Negro.'"  Though the Republicans have largely
written off blacks, the growing Hispanic population is a tempting target for
GOP vote getters.  Some aides believed there was a strong possibility of a
Hispanic nominee, although they also warned of Bush's penchant for surprise.
	Whoever gets named will be grilled very hard on the subject of
abortion.  David Souter, Bush's choice for the court last summer, was able to
finesse his confirmation hearing largely because he had no paper trial. 
Democrats are determined that the next nominee will not be able to skate
through so easily.  Their aim is to drive a "wedge issue" right through the
Republican Party on the eve of the 1992 elections.  It is widely anticipated
that the new Bush court will throw out Roe v. Wade, the court's landmark 1973
decision giving women a constitutional right to abortion.  Actually, the
justices may not go that far, but at the very least they are likely to approve
more abortion restrictions.  A flat reversal of Roe could come a year from
now-just as the Republicans prepare to renominate George Bush.
	For the first time in recent memory, there could be a real and
divisive floor fight over abortion at the Republican convention.  Since 1976
the GOP platform has been strongly pro-life.  But now pro-choice and pro-life
lobbying groups are trying to line up single-issue delegates to champion their
causes.  "The abortion issue is the Republican's Molotov cocktail," says
Democratic pollster Harrison Hickman, who does surveys for the National
Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL).  "I think it's about ready to explode."
	If it does, the Republicans can forget their hope of "realignment," of
forging a permanent GOP majority.  The GOP is stronger among younger voters
(18-24) than among any other age group.  But younger voters tend to be
pro-choice.  More fundamentally, they resent any government intrusion into
their private lives.  The judicial conservatives on the court are not
libertarians.  If anything, they are "statists" who defer to the will of
popularly elected legislatures.  If the federal and local governments begin
legislating morality, young voters could turn to the Democrats.
	The old cliche is that the justices follow the election returns.  But
history tells a different story.  At three critical junctures over the past
two centuries, the Supreme Court has gotten out of kilter with public
opinion-and sparked a political backlash that profoundly remade society.  In
1857 the Supreme Court's infamous Dred Scott Decision, which ruled that slaves
were mere chattel, helped propel the newly created Republican Party into the
White House (and the nation into Civil War).  In 1935 the "nine old men" on
the high court threw out the core of the New Deal-and handed Franklin
Roosevelt a perfect foil.
	The court under Earl Warren was well ahead of its time when it
outlawed segregated schools in 1954.  The court's ringing endorsements of
individual rights and equality under the law helped forge a liberal consensus
in the 1960s.  But those decisions made the court a fat target for the nascent
conservative movement.  "Most of the things we were complaining about were
Supreme Court decisions," said Phyllis Schlafly, and early right-wing activist
and abortion foe.  As the conservative movement grew in the '70s, and the GOP
established a lock on the White House in the '80s, Republican administrations
pushed the judiciary to the right, choosing well over half of all federal
judges.
	The pendulum will swing again.  One reason that the Constitution has
survived for more than 200 years is that the Supreme Court has been able to
reinterpret it, as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. said, to meet "the felt
necessities of the time."  A "multicultural" society-one resistant to the old
melting-pot ideal-is sure to confront the Supreme Court with divisive
questions about the rights of minority groups.  The growing gap between rich
and poor, the breakup of the traditional family and the capacity of science to
extend and alter human life will further test the justices' capacity for
wisdom and fairness.  America, then, will keep changing, and with it the
Supreme Court.  George Bush had reasons to be cautions last week which
extended beyond temporal politics.  Administrations come and go, their famous
victories forgotten like so much swept-up confetti.  It is the pople Bush will
leave behind on the Supreme Court who will be his most enduring legacy.
 
by,
Howard Fineman and Evan Thomas, with Ann McDaniel and Bob Cohn
 
 
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:46:29
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article TTOOA
To: choice
 
 
"Tipping the Odds on Abortion," NEWSWEEK, July 8
 
Abortion-rights advocates had reason to worry last week.  Although the Supreme
Court already has a conservative majority, Thurgood Marshall's resignation
makes it even more likely that there will soon be a serious challenge to Roe
v. Wade, the 1973 decision legalizing aboriton.  Four of the justices-William
Rehnquist, Byron White, Antonin Scalia, and Anthony Kennedy- are considered
already prepared to overrule Roe.  It's not yet clear how Justices Sandra Day
O'Connor and David Souter would vote, but either could choose to be the fifth
vote to overturn Roe.  Marshall's replacement, another Republican appointee,
only shortens the odds in favor of a flat reversal or more severe limitations
on a woman's right to abortion.
	The justices probably won't have to wait long for a case that will
give them the chance to rule on the issue.  Pennsylvania's abortion law,
enacted in 1989, was found unconstitutional by a federal district court last
year.  The case will now be heard on appeal in Philadelphia, one short step
away from the Supreme Court.  Although there's no way to predict when or even
if a case will appear on the court's calendar, the Pennsylvania law could be
heard by the justices as early as the next session, which starts in October. 
However, legal experts say that the Pennsylvania law may not be specific
enough to overturn Roe, because the law requires certain procedures before an
abortion-notification of the husband, a waiting period and counseling-but does
not prohibit abortion outright.  If the court hears the case, it could rule
just on the constitutionality of those procedures and not on abortion itself.
	Two other laws are also in the federal court pipeline.  Guam's 1990
law prohibits abortions except when the mother's life is in danger.  A federal
district court has found it unconstitutional but it has not yet been heard by
an appeals court.  Utah's statute, approved in January, bans most abortions. 
The only exceptions are rape or incest or cases in which the mother's life is
in danger or the fetus has a "grave" defect.  The state has not yet enforced
it, because a lawsuit has been filed.
	Although the Pennsylvania, Utah and Guam statutes have been in the
courts for months, the nation's most recent-and most restrictive-abortion law,
in Louisiana, might beat all three to the high court.  Just two weeks ago the
state legislature overrode Gov. Buddy Roemer's veto of the measure, which
prohibits abortion except in certain cases of rape or incest or where the
mother's life is at risk.  The ACLU has already filed a challenge, and US
District Judge Adrian Duplantier, who is hearing the case, has told the
lawyers involved that he doesn't plan to dawdle.  The trial is scheduled to
begin July 23.  If, as expected, Duplantier declares the law unconstitutional,
then Louisiana Attorney General Billy Guste will try to expedite the case
through the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in time to arrive at the Supreme
Court in the fall.
	Earlier this year, the Supreme Court upheld a ban on abortion
counseling at federally funded clinics.  That regulation, the justices said,
passed constitutional muster.  Now the question is whether it is also
politically viable.  In Congress, the House has voted to reverse the ban.  If
the Senate follows suit, then President Bush has threatened a veto.  A bitter
override fight would surely folllow.  There is a lesson here: no matter what
happens to Roe, abortion will remain a critical issue, but instead of being
fought in the courts, the battles wil be in voting booths.
 
by
Barbara Kantrowitz with Ginny Carroll
 
 
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:50:44
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article NYT
To: choice
 
The NY Times today reported that, in a 1987 speech, Judge Thomas praised an
essay by Lewis Lehrman which called a fetus a "child-about-to-be-born".   In
his speech before the Heritage Foundation, Thomas said it was important to
recover a sense of  what philosphers call "natural law".  The speech was
entitled "Why Black Americans Should Look to Conservative Politics", and was
based upon the belief that Americans should restore the connecton between
ethics and politics like the one that Abraham Lincoln made when he argued
against slavery.  The Lehrman essay compared fetuses to slaves and quoted (or
misquoted) from Lincoln directly and called abortion a holocaust. "Adapting
Lincoln's words from his patient struggle for the inalienable right to liberty
in the 1850's, we man now say that the 'duable' moral issue of our age is the
struggle for the inalienable right to life of the child-in-the-womb..." said
Lehrman.
 
The speech by Thomas was disclosed by National NARAL.  Kate Michelman said
that the group would oppose the confirmation of Thomas to the Supreme Court.
 
posted to the newsgroup talk.abortion by Scott Safier
 
 
 
"Senate OK's abortion counseling; Bush expected to veto bill that lifts curb
on clinics"
by Renu Sehgal, "The Boston Globe," Thursday, July18, 1991
 
	The Senate voted yesterday to overturn a ban on abortion counseling by
federally funded family planning clinics, setting up a confrontation with
President Bush, who has said he will veto the legislation.
	The Senate acted by voice vote, leaving in doubt whether the bill has
the two thirds majority needed to override a veto.
	"Both the House and the Senate have now convincingly repudiated the
Reagan-Bush administration's gag rule regulations and reaffirmed the right of
physicians to practice medicine without government censorship," said Senator
Edward M. Kennedy.  "It is hypocritical of the White House to try to require
doctors to violate their Hippocratic oath."
	The bill, sponsored by Republican Senator John H. Chafee of Rhode
Island and 44 other senators, would reverse a rule issued by the Dept. of
Health and Human Services banning federally funded family clinics from
advising clients that abortion is an option.  The rule was challenged in the
courts and never put into effect.  The Supreme Court upheld its
constitutionality in May, however, and the administration said the ban would
be implemented this fall, affecting 3,800 clinics.
	"I'm outraged at the spinelessness of the US Senate," Judy Brown of
the antiabortion American Life Lobby told Knight-Ridder Service.  "I don't
understand why they would not go on record.  It sends a very weak message to
President Bush."
	"I think it's an indicator that they don't have the votes for an
override," said Susan Smith, the associate legislative director for the
National Right to Life Committee.
	The bill passed with two conflicting amendments on parental
notification, one making it easier for minors to get an abortion; one making
it more restrictive.  The conflict will be worked out when the House and
Senate meet in conference on the bill.
	The bill also;
*Adds language to exempt family planning clinic employees with religious or
moral convictions  from mentioning abortion as long as they inform the client
of their position.
*Exempts states from parental notification requirements if the state has held
a referendum on the issue.
*Allows all states to receive funds under the Title X Family Planning Act
regardless of parental notification or consent laws for any health care
service to a minor.
	Senator Orrin Hatch's home state of Utah has a strict parental consent
law for minors wishing contraception from clinics, which has resulted in
denial of federal funds for Utah's clinics.  For several years, Hatch has
tried to insert that amendment into the Title X law but has been unsuccessful
until now.
	Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina had threatened to introduce
several amendments to stymie debate, but backed down.
	According to Senator Bob Dole of Kansas, "The White House thought it
was a good idea not to have a roll-call vote."
	"Helms was concerned about a roll-call vote," Chafee said.  "He
probably concluded that a roll-call vote would make it more difficult for the
White House" to show that a veto could be sustained.
	Despite indications that the voice vote was a concession to Helms,
Hatch said neither side wanted a roll-call vote.
	John Sununu, the White House chief of staff, made phone calls from
London yesterday morning to Helms and Hatch, the leading opponents of the
Chafee bill.  According to Hatch, "Sununu said the president intends to veto
the bill" as it stands.
	Republican Senator Dave Durenberger of Minnesota had introduced an
administration-backed proposal that would have eliminated all counseling for a
pregnant woman in a federally subsidized clinic.  Its defeat on Tuesday
signaled an unwillingness by Congress to retain any of the regulations.  But
the 35 votes cast for it suggested there is enough support to sustain a veto.
	"That they went for a voice vote is a clear indication" that abortion
opponents "are worried a number of Republicans won't stand up with them on
this issue," said Sally Patterson, the executive vice president for public
affairs for Planned Parenthood.
	"If you don't want to show you don't have the votes" to sustain a
veto, you want a voice vote, Kennedy said.  "The tide is moving in our
direction."
	Kennedy and other advocates of the measure said they were confident
about overriding the expected presidential veto.
	"Because overturning the gag rule won the support of even traditional
antichoice representatives and senators, President Bush may yet see the
writing on the wall, and keep his veto pen in his pocket," said Judith
Lichtman, president of the Women's Legal Defense Fund.
	The House approved a similar bill last month, also by voice vote,
effectively reversing the regulation.
 
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Date: 23 Jul 91 14:26:07
From: Susan.Ackerman@mac.dartmouth.edu
Subject: Summer reading
To: busy::katz

    
    re: Liz Holtzmann
    
    Thanks for the answer.  Actually, I don't expect her to win, and I'm
    not sure she would be our best bet anyway.  What we NEED is a candidate
    who can beat Al D'Amato and I'm not sure Liz can.  She doesn't have all
    that much exposure outside of NY city.  The other 3 (current) candidates 
    are Gerry Ferraro, who in my opinion would never beat D'Amato, mostly
    due to all the bad press, Bob Mazarac, who's name is probably spelled 
    wrong - he's from Long Island and at the moment has VERY little exposure 
    anywhere - even here in NYC, and Robert Abrams, NY State Attorney General, 
    who I think has the best shot of beating D'Amato and is therefore who 
    I'll probably vote for - or who I'd vote for today anyway.  He's got the 
    state-wide exposure, and while there are plenty of things we don't agree 
    on, he is DEFINATELY pro-choice.
    
    We now return you to your regularly scheduled discussion. :-)
    
    Phyllis
    

    
    re .277
    It was D'Amato who beat Holtzman in 1980.
    

All articles reprinted w/o permission
    
    \D/
    
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:44:43
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article GFL
To: choice
 
"Good for the Left, Now Good for the Right", NEWSWEEK, July 8 edition
excerpt from article talking about judicial politics
 
...In the term's most controversial decision, Rust v. Sullivan, the court by a
5-4 vote upheld federal regulations barring all discussion of abortion in
family-planning clinics that receive government money.  Doctors had no
free-speech rights to advise patients.  The regulations, authorized by a 1970
act of Congress, were issued in 1988 by the Reagan administration.  They
represented a 180-degree change in rules that had been in effect for the prior
18 years that required clinic employees to provide abortion information. 
While the Supreme Court acknowledged the ambiguity of the 1970
legislation-normally enough to strike down the regulations subsequently
passed-it nonetheless went on to consider the constitutional question.  That
was more than even O'Connor could stand.  Dissenting, she scolded her brethren
for violating "a fundamental rule of judicial restraint."
	Rehnquist, who wrote the Rust opinion in May, justified it on the
ground that administrative agencies deserve deference when statutes are
ambiguous.  Yet, two months earlier, Rehnquist refused to defer to a different
agency in a case about the application of U.S. antidiscrimination law
overseas.  "Both these decisions can't be right," says Duke University law
professor Walter Dellinger.  "This court has abandoned any pretense of
neutrality."
	Against that backdrop, the departure of Thurgood Marshall is of more
symbolic meaning than anything else.  The last, great liberal on the bench is
gone.  In terms of results, it doesn't matter much.  The conservatives-average
age, 60-own the farm, and the ideological horses are already out of the barn. 
Marshall seemed to recognize as much when, in his Payne dissent, he offered a
list of endangered precedents "now ripe for reconsideration" by the emboldened
court, including those which approved minority set-asides for government
contractors, the exclusion of insane murderers from execution, the bar on
govt. aid to parochial schools, and, of course, Roe v. Wade.  All that really
happens, then, when Marshall is replaced by someone more conservative is that
the Rehnquist bloc will pick up more steam.
	That's a lot for the liberals to lament.  But it's hard to be
sympathetic.  Thirty years ago it was their turn to bask in the glow of
judicial activism, Warren style.  In that era, the majority justices would
peer into the Constitution and create new rights, without answering
conservative critics who demanded to know the legitimate sources for their
unprecedented forays.  "One of the saddest lessons of recent decades," says
Gunther, "is that judges have given up their explaining function because they
just don't believe in it.  It's only the result that matters."...
 
The Eight Thurgood Leaves Behind
William Rehnquist (age 66): Nixon's revenge.  Leader of the counterrevolution.
Harry Blackmun (age 82): Last of the liberals.  Desperately wants to preserve
Roe v. Wade.
Anthony Kennedy (age 54): The most obscure justice, the fellow in Bork's seat. 
A reliable member of the Rehnquist bloc.
Sandra Day O'Connor (age 61): A centrist, if such a thing exists anymore.  Roe
may yet rest in her hands.
Antonin Scalia (age 55): Rashomon of the Constitution; to the liberals, he's
the Prince of Darkness, to conservatives, he's the deity.
David Souter (age 51): So much for the Stealth nominee.  O'Connor in a
three-piece suit.
John Paul Stevens (age 71): A strong Marshall ally recently, but still the
court maverick.
Byron White (age 74): Senior in tenure, and the only justice named by a
Democrat.
 
by
David Kaplan and Bob Cohn
 
	  
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:43:08
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article HFR
To: choice
 
 
"How Far Right?"  from NEWSWEEK, July 8, 1991 edition
 
	When George Bush heard the news that Thurgood Marshall had resigned
from the Supreme Court last week, the president did not exactly jump for joy. 
He did not cry "Eureka! A victory for the unborn!" or "Thank goodness, now we
can lock up those criminals!"  Instead, Bush responded cautiously and rather
tepidly, "That's very interesting."
	The president was wise to temper his enthusiasm.  The chance to
replace a legendary liberal on the high court is a mixed blessing, even for a
conservative chief executive.  True, Justice Marshall was one of the principal
architects of a judicial edifice that Republican presidents have been trying
to dismantle for the past two decades.  On the court, Marshall was a powerful
voice and vote against the death penalty, against prayer in schools, for
mandatory busing of schoolchildren, for greater rights for the criminally
accused.  He believed that freedom of speech, no matter how distasteful, was
nearly absolute and he never met an affirmative-action program he didn't like. 
By replacing Marshall with a conservative, Bush has an opportunity to complete
a counterrevolution, to end one era on the Supreme Court and begin another.
	But the change must be carefully calibrated.  What if the court does
not stop where it is-somewhere to the right of center, but still safely in the
mainstream of popular mores and attitudes?  Will Americans still be applauding
(and voting GOP) is the court keeps on moving to the right-if it severly
restricts abortions, abandons the rights of minorities and women, and gives
the other branches of government license to do pretty much whatever they
please, all under the mantle of "judicial restraint"?
	Bush, the political pragmatist, knows the risks to himself and his
party.  According to White House aides, he had no interest in finding a rabid
right-winger to fill Marshall's seat.  One obvious candidate (ed. note; who
has since officially been nominated) was Judge Clarence Thomas of the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.  Like Marshall, Thomas, 43, is
and African-American.  His race set up a Capitol irony: Bush, the avowed foe
of quotas, trying to fill the "black seat" on the court.  But his advisers
were more worried that Thomas would be attacked for lack of experience (he has
been on the bench for only 16 months).  Others warned that the former head of
the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, who opposed most
affirmative-action plans, would be branded as a turncoat by civil-rights
groups.  For his part, Marshall counseled the president that race should not
be used as "an excuse for doing wrong... picking the wrong Negro and saying
'I'm picking him because he's a Negro.'"  Though the Republicans have largely
written off blacks, the growing Hispanic population is a tempting target for
GOP vote getters.  Some aides believed there was a strong possibility of a
Hispanic nominee, although they also warned of Bush's penchant for surprise.
	Whoever gets named will be grilled very hard on the subject of
abortion.  David Souter, Bush's choice for the court last summer, was able to
finesse his confirmation hearing largely because he had no paper trial. 
Democrats are determined that the next nominee will not be able to skate
through so easily.  Their aim is to drive a "wedge issue" right through the
Republican Party on the eve of the 1992 elections.  It is widely anticipated
that the new Bush court will throw out Roe v. Wade, the court's landmark 1973
decision giving women a constitutional right to abortion.  Actually, the
justices may not go that far, but at the very least they are likely to approve
more abortion restrictions.  A flat reversal of Roe could come a year from
now-just as the Republicans prepare to renominate George Bush.
	For the first time in recent memory, there could be a real and
divisive floor fight over abortion at the Republican convention.  Since 1976
the GOP platform has been strongly pro-life.  But now pro-choice and pro-life
lobbying groups are trying to line up single-issue delegates to champion their
causes.  "The abortion issue is the Republican's Molotov cocktail," says
Democratic pollster Harrison Hickman, who does surveys for the National
Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL).  "I think it's about ready to explode."
	If it does, the Republicans can forget their hope of "realignment," of
forging a permanent GOP majority.  The GOP is stronger among younger voters
(18-24) than among any other age group.  But younger voters tend to be
pro-choice.  More fundamentally, they resent any government intrusion into
their private lives.  The judicial conservatives on the court are not
libertarians.  If anything, they are "statists" who defer to the will of
popularly elected legislatures.  If the federal and local governments begin
legislating morality, young voters could turn to the Democrats.
	The old cliche is that the justices follow the election returns.  But
history tells a different story.  At three critical junctures over the past
two centuries, the Supreme Court has gotten out of kilter with public
opinion-and sparked a political backlash that profoundly remade society.  In
1857 the Supreme Court's infamous Dred Scott Decision, which ruled that slaves
were mere chattel, helped propel the newly created Republican Party into the
White House (and the nation into Civil War).  In 1935 the "nine old men" on
the high court threw out the core of the New Deal-and handed Franklin
Roosevelt a perfect foil.
	The court under Earl Warren was well ahead of its time when it
outlawed segregated schools in 1954.  The court's ringing endorsements of
individual rights and equality under the law helped forge a liberal consensus
in the 1960s.  But those decisions made the court a fat target for the nascent
conservative movement.  "Most of the things we were complaining about were
Supreme Court decisions," said Phyllis Schlafly, and early right-wing activist
and abortion foe.  As the conservative movement grew in the '70s, and the GOP
established a lock on the White House in the '80s, Republican administrations
pushed the judiciary to the right, choosing well over half of all federal
judges.
	The pendulum will swing again.  One reason that the Constitution has
survived for more than 200 years is that the Supreme Court has been able to
reinterpret it, as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. said, to meet "the felt
necessities of the time."  A "multicultural" society-one resistant to the old
melting-pot ideal-is sure to confront the Supreme Court with divisive
questions about the rights of minority groups.  The growing gap between rich
and poor, the breakup of the traditional family and the capacity of science to
extend and alter human life will further test the justices' capacity for
wisdom and fairness.  America, then, will keep changing, and with it the
Supreme Court.  George Bush had reasons to be cautions last week which
extended beyond temporal politics.  Administrations come and go, their famous
victories forgotten like so much swept-up confetti.  It is the pople Bush will
leave behind on the Supreme Court who will be his most enduring legacy.
 
by,
Howard Fineman and Evan Thomas, with Ann McDaniel and Bob Cohn
 
 
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:46:29
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article TTOOA
To: choice
 
 
"Tipping the Odds on Abortion," NEWSWEEK, July 8
 
Abortion-rights advocates had reason to worry last week.  Although the Supreme
Court already has a conservative majority, Thurgood Marshall's resignation
makes it even more likely that there will soon be a serious challenge to Roe
v. Wade, the 1973 decision legalizing aboriton.  Four of the justices-William
Rehnquist, Byron White, Antonin Scalia, and Anthony Kennedy- are considered
already prepared to overrule Roe.  It's not yet clear how Justices Sandra Day
O'Connor and David Souter would vote, but either could choose to be the fifth
vote to overturn Roe.  Marshall's replacement, another Republican appointee,
only shortens the odds in favor of a flat reversal or more severe limitations
on a woman's right to abortion.
	The justices probably won't have to wait long for a case that will
give them the chance to rule on the issue.  Pennsylvania's abortion law,
enacted in 1989, was found unconstitutional by a federal district court last
year.  The case will now be heard on appeal in Philadelphia, one short step
away from the Supreme Court.  Although there's no way to predict when or even
if a case will appear on the court's calendar, the Pennsylvania law could be
heard by the justices as early as the next session, which starts in October. 
However, legal experts say that the Pennsylvania law may not be specific
enough to overturn Roe, because the law requires certain procedures before an
abortion-notification of the husband, a waiting period and counseling-but does
not prohibit abortion outright.  If the court hears the case, it could rule
just on the constitutionality of those procedures and not on abortion itself.
	Two other laws are also in the federal court pipeline.  Guam's 1990
law prohibits abortions except when the mother's life is in danger.  A federal
district court has found it unconstitutional but it has not yet been heard by
an appeals court.  Utah's statute, approved in January, bans most abortions. 
The only exceptions are rape or incest or cases in which the mother's life is
in danger or the fetus has a "grave" defect.  The state has not yet enforced
it, because a lawsuit has been filed.
	Although the Pennsylvania, Utah and Guam statutes have been in the
courts for months, the nation's most recent-and most restrictive-abortion law,
in Louisiana, might beat all three to the high court.  Just two weeks ago the
state legislature overrode Gov. Buddy Roemer's veto of the measure, which
prohibits abortion except in certain cases of rape or incest or where the
mother's life is at risk.  The ACLU has already filed a challenge, and US
District Judge Adrian Duplantier, who is hearing the case, has told the
lawyers involved that he doesn't plan to dawdle.  The trial is scheduled to
begin July 23.  If, as expected, Duplantier declares the law unconstitutional,
then Louisiana Attorney General Billy Guste will try to expedite the case
through the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in time to arrive at the Supreme
Court in the fall.
	Earlier this year, the Supreme Court upheld a ban on abortion
counseling at federally funded clinics.  That regulation, the justices said,
passed constitutional muster.  Now the question is whether it is also
politically viable.  In Congress, the House has voted to reverse the ban.  If
the Senate follows suit, then President Bush has threatened a veto.  A bitter
override fight would surely folllow.  There is a lesson here: no matter what
happens to Roe, abortion will remain a critical issue, but instead of being
fought in the courts, the battles wil be in voting booths.
 
by
Barbara Kantrowitz with Ginny Carroll
 
 
Date: 12 Jul 91 18:50:44
From: Kristen K. Patterson
Subject: article NYT
To: choice
 
The NY Times today reported that, in a 1987 speech, Judge Thomas praised an
essay by Lewis Lehrman which called a fetus a "child-about-to-be-born".   In
his speech before the Heritage Foundation, Thomas said it was important to
recover a sense of  what philosphers call "natural law".  The speech was
entitled "Why Black Americans Should Look to Conservative Politics", and was
based upon the belief that Americans should restore the connecton between
ethics and politics like the one that Abraham Lincoln made when he argued
against slavery.  The Lehrman essay compared fetuses to slaves and quoted (or
misquoted) from Lincoln directly and called abortion a holocaust. "Adapting
Lincoln's words from his patient struggle for the inalienable right to liberty
in the 1850's, we man now say that the 'duable' moral issue of our age is the
struggle for the inalienable right to life of the child-in-the-womb..." said
Lehrman.
 
The speech by Thomas was disclosed by National NARAL.  Kate Michelman said
that the group would oppose the confirmation of Thomas to the Supreme Court.
 
posted to the newsgroup talk.abortion by Scott Safier
 
 
 
"Senate OK's abortion counseling; Bush expected to veto bill that lifts curb
on clinics"
by Renu Sehgal, "The Boston Globe," Thursday, July18, 1991
 
	The Senate voted yesterday to overturn a ban on abortion counseling by
federally funded family planning clinics, setting up a confrontation with
President Bush, who has said he will veto the legislation.
	The Senate acted by voice vote, leaving in doubt whether the bill has
the two thirds majority needed to override a veto.
	"Both the House and the Senate have now convincingly repudiated the
Reagan-Bush administration's gag rule regulations and reaffirmed the right of
physicians to practice medicine without government censorship," said Senator
Edward M. Kennedy.  "It is hypocritical of the White House to try to require
doctors to violate their Hippocratic oath."
	The bill, sponsored by Republican Senator John H. Chafee of Rhode
Island and 44 other senators, would reverse a rule issued by the Dept. of
Health and Human Services banning federally funded family clinics from
advising clients that abortion is an option.  The rule was challenged in the
courts and never put into effect.  The Supreme Court upheld its
constitutionality in May, however, and the administration said the ban would
be implemented this fall, affecting 3,800 clinics.
	"I'm outraged at the spinelessness of the US Senate," Judy Brown of
the antiabortion American Life Lobby told Knight-Ridder Service.  "I don't
understand why they would not go on record.  It sends a very weak message to
President Bush."
	"I think it's an indicator that they don't have the votes for an
override," said Susan Smith, the associate legislative director for the
National Right to Life Committee.
	The bill passed with two conflicting amendments on parental
notification, one making it easier for minors to get an abortion; one making
it more restrictive.  The conflict will be worked out when the House and
Senate meet in conference on the bill.
	The bill also;
*Adds language to exempt family planning clinic employees with religious or
moral convictions  from mentioning abortion as long as they inform the client
of their position.
*Exempts states from parental notification requirements if the state has held
a referendum on the issue.
*Allows all states to receive funds under the Title X Family Planning Act
regardless of parental notification or consent laws for any health care
service to a minor.
	Senator Orrin Hatch's home state of Utah has a strict parental consent
law for minors wishing contraception from clinics, which has resulted in
denial of federal funds for Utah's clinics.  For several years, Hatch has
tried to insert that amendment into the Title X law but has been unsuccessful
until now.
	Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina had threatened to introduce
several amendments to stymie debate, but backed down.
	According to Senator Bob Dole of Kansas, "The White House thought it
was a good idea not to have a roll-call vote."
	"Helms was concerned about a roll-call vote," Chafee said.  "He
probably concluded that a roll-call vote would make it more difficult for the
White House" to show that a veto could be sustained.
	Despite indications that the voice vote was a concession to Helms,
Hatch said neither side wanted a roll-call vote.
	John Sununu, the White House chief of staff, made phone calls from
London yesterday morning to Helms and Hatch, the leading opponents of the
Chafee bill.  According to Hatch, "Sununu said the president intends to veto
the bill" as it stands.
	Republican Senator Dave Durenberger of Minnesota had introduced an
administration-backed proposal that would have eliminated all counseling for a
pregnant woman in a federally subsidized clinic.  Its defeat on Tuesday
signaled an unwillingness by Congress to retain any of the regulations.  But
the 35 votes cast for it suggested there is enough support to sustain a veto.
	"That they went for a voice vote is a clear indication" that abortion
opponents "are worried a number of Republicans won't stand up with them on
this issue," said Sally Patterson, the executive vice president for public
affairs for Planned Parenthood.
	"If you don't want to show you don't have the votes" to sustain a
veto, you want a voice vote, Kennedy said.  "The tide is moving in our
direction."
	Kennedy and other advocates of the measure said they were confident
about overriding the expected presidential veto.
	"Because overturning the gag rule won the support of even traditional
antichoice representatives and senators, President Bush may yet see the
writing on the wall, and keep his veto pen in his pocket," said Judith
Lichtman, president of the Women's Legal Defense Fund.
	The House approved a similar bill last month, also by voice vote,
effectively reversing the regulation.
 

    
    Just a quick FYI..
    
    While I was out tabling for NARAL the other night, one of the things we
    had out were some slips of paper with Judge Kelly's address on it. 
    Apparently, the week before, a lot of folks had been stopping at the 
    table and asking about sending him letters of thanks/appreciation/
    encouragement, etc.  So, I swiped one :-).. thinking maybe some of us
    would like to drop him a line.
    
    		Judge Patrick F. Kelly
    		Federal Courthouse
    		401 N. Market St.
    		Wichita, KS  67202
    
    Phyllis
    
    

    Sorry, but
    
    	Who's he?
    
    Am I missing something major?
    
    Alice T.

    Judge Kelly is the Federal judge who put an injunction against OR
    blocking access to clinics.  His ruling is currently being challenged
    by the Bush administration's "justice" department on the grounds that
    pregnant women do not have the same civil rights needs as other people. 
    (His injuntion ruling was based on an old KKK law regarding civil
    rights for people of color)
    
    Meg

    There's a new bill being proposed by {needless to say, I remembered his
    name until I starting writing this note} which will mandate that
    doctors must "notify pregnant mothers whether a fetus heart-beat has
    been detected."
    
    Anti-abortion activitists claim that this is just adding to numerous
    laws regulating what doctors must and can't say to their patients, and
    has nothing to do with abortion rights; abortion rights activitists say
    this is a measure to discourage women with unwanted pregnancies from
    having abortions by "humanizing the fetus."
    
    D!

    re -1
    
    I first heard of this and reacted with great anger.  My anger is due
    partly to two reasons.  One is that the bill is being proposed by a 
    male. Now I know that this is just my opinion, but it really bothers
    me that someone who would never be realistically faced with making
    the decision to abort would be allowed to try to pass a law about it.
    But that is life and men and women are entitled to their own opinions.
    
    The second reason it really bothers me is that I do not feel it will
    honestly discourage any woman who seeks an abortion from having one.
    I would welcome a study done before this bill was even proposed to
    see if the wanted end result of the bill would be an actuality.
    Would anyone happen to know if there have been any such studies done?
    If so what was the percentage rate of women who choose not to abort?
    
    
    I feel that this bill would only serve to make an already difficult 
    ordeal that much more difficult and traumatic.  
    
    Michele

    It is particularly painful because the heart is among the first things
    in a fetus to develop.  Some evidence of heartbeat is discernable
    through ultrasound long long before there is a brain, spine, lungs, or
    even a ciculatory system. 
    
    In other words, long long before there is much that can be identified as
    a fetus to anyone but a biologist. Depending on the equipment, it can
    be seen at about 5 weeks, long before many women even know they are
    pregnant.  It is not a heart as we think of a human heart.  
    
    I see the proposed law as designed to cause pain, unless it also
    stipulates that the doctor provide a full course in development so the
    heartbeat is in context.  Given how early a heartbeat can be
    detected, most abortions are performed when a heartbeat is present.  I
    know this may cause pain to some women who have had abortions.  I can
    think of little about abortion that is not painful emotionally or
    physically. Except the knowledge that the abortion was the best answer
    at the time.  And if it was for the best, then it was, heartbeat or not.
    
       Margaret

    Oh, also, forgot to mention...
    
    there is some contraversy over the fact that most abortion clinics
    don't have Ultrasound equipment, and it is VERY EXPENSIVE.  It is
    unclear whether the law would require an ultrasound check for a
    heartbeat before an abortion could be done, in which case a woman who
    knew she was pregnant would still have to go to a doctor, or abortion
    clinics would have to get ultrasound equipment.
    
    This is ridiculous.
    
    D!

    
    
    re -1
    
    If I remember correctly, this is the second try at getting this bill
    passed.  Does anyone have the exact wording of the bill?  
    
    
    Michele

    re; .286, ultrasound equipment.
    
    Why is this ridiculous?
    
    Becky

    re.288
    
    It doesn't take ultrasound to detect a heartbeat.  That can be _heard_
    with a stethescope.  Ultrasound lets you _watch_ a heartbeat.
    
    I mean, I know my heart is beating even though I've never actually
    _seen_ it in action -- I can feel it by my pulse and I can hear it via
    a stethescope [another person can here it if I let hir rest an ear on
    my chest]
    
      Annie

    well, when I was pregnant, the doc could even let me hear the heartbeat
    very early on, though I don't remember just when.  Both kids had their
    pictures taken with ultrasound.  The main reason for it seemed to be to
    determine their size, and compare it to my reports of when my last
    period had been and to the doc's estimate of when full term will be.
    In short, ultrasound is used, at least in part, to
    determine how far along the pregnancy is.  One can see, then, why it
    would be a useful tool in any clinic that deals with pregnant women.

    Can someone explain to me the new law in Massachusetts barring the
    blocking of abortion clinics? Who were the legislators involved?
    
    It always baffled me that political candidates could not picket within
    a certain number of yards from the polling booth because it interferes
    with my right to vote yet a person could deny me access to an abortion
    clinic denying me my right to privacy. 
    
    This is a victory for Massachusetts. 
    
    Yeeaa! Yippee!
    
    Kate

    Washington has an initiative on the ballot for November election
    regarding abortion.  It is a very pro-choice initiative, which I
    definitely support.  However, my problem with this initiative lies in
    the fact that it states that abortions can be performed by doctors
    until such time that the fetus could be viable.  It does not state only
    the first trimester or through such and such month.  The section that
    concerns me reads:
    
    "The good faith judgement of a physician as to viability of the fetus
    or as to risk to life or health of a woman and the good faith judgement
    of a health care provider as to the duration of pregnancy shall be a
    defense in any proceeding in which a violation of this chapter is an
    issue."
    
    This is a very liberal initiative and for the most part I support it. 
    But, I don't necessarily agree with 2nd or 3rd trimester abortions. 
    I never have.  My concerns are that this initiative will call for a
    judgement of physicians that will increase 2nd or 3rd trimester
    abortions.
    
    Comments?
    
    Karen

    Having seen D!'s note about the laws in Pennsylvania, I'm going to
    stick my foot in it and say that they make a LOT of sense to me.
    
    For minors, considering that parents have to give permission for field
    trips, having parental consent for a medical procedure makes damned
    good legislative sense. I cannot think of ANY other minor surgery for
    which a parent or guardian's approval is not required. Minors are NOT
    women. They are girls. Just because they did something very adult
    doesn't mean that their parents aren't still legally, morally and often
    medically and financially responsible.
    
    As for a 24-hour waiting period, I don't see what the big deal is AT ALL.
    RU-486 is not available in the US. Therefore its is highly improper to
    perform an abortion at the point when the typical woman realizes she's
    pregnant. Women in "denial" are another story, but one day is not going
    to make the fetus viable.
    
    Finally, there's marriage. And as a person who is NOT married, I don't
    think I can really say what does and doesn't belong within a marriage.
    There are many men who are having their parental consciousness
    awakened. It seems like a slap in the face to say that a husband should
    not have any say in the aborting of his potential off-spring. On the
    other hand, I think any husband who insists that a child be carried to term
    against the wishes of the mother should sign on to some very tightly
    woven custody and financial responsibility documents. He should be
    fingerprinted, blood-typed, subpoenaed and possibly forced to post
    a $10,000 bail until birth so that he cannot escape the responsibility of his
    decision.
    
    Its quite possible that the objection to these laws is that they make
    inroads on free and uncontested "choice". Yet, to anyone who is
    "reasonable" about the complexity of the abortion issue, it should not
    be surprising that such laws might pass. Moreover, that the pro-choice
    contingent may have conceded them as a compromise, and plans to make
    clear that no further inroads to choice will be permitted.

    I tend to agree with 'ren on the parts of the bill that passed.
    
    The 24-hour waiting period seems sane.  The only minor surgical
    procedure I've ever had done with no waiting was when I got stitches. 
    Generally I make appointments [no not for abortions, I've never had
    one].
    
    Parental consent is a toughie for me.  Yes, I know many girls are
    afraid of their parents knowing and I have a great deal of sympathy for
    them.  Yet it also seems that parental consent would be a protection
    all around.  It isn't a risk-free procedure, if complications were to
    arise better that a parent had been informed rather than be surprised.
    
    Being a married person myself, I must say that I feel that requiring a
    woman to obtain spousal consent is draconian.  I do believe that the
    husband is an interested and concerned party who has every right to
    know and should have input to the decision.  I also believe that such a
    decision that's not made jointly could do incredible damage to the
    relationship.  Yet, I cannot accept requiring a woman to get permission
    from her husband to abort.  Ultimately, if both parties do not agree,
    it the woman who bears the risk either way.  I really believe that hers
    should be the tie-breaking vote.
    
      Annie

	The unborn child bears even more risk. I would think that the unborn
	child should get the tiebreaking vote.

					Tom_K

    The parental consent portion is the most defensible in my opinion, but
    only with some reasonableness guidelines in place.  These include that
    either parent, but not necessarily both, must consent.  This is
    particularly important for girls whose parents are divorced, or for
    some reason don't have contact with both parents.  Also, a judicial
    remedy, where the girl in question can approach a judge for the
    necessary consent, should also be in place.  The possibility of being
    thrown out of the house/disowned/physical abuse when she lets a parent
    know of her condition is a real threat in some cases.
    
    I haven't known of an abortion yet, in my personal experience, that was
    carried out less than 48 hours from the original approach requesting
    information on how to obtain one.  More often, the wait between
    original request and actual abortion was measured in weeks.  Possibly, 
    for those who have had to travel a long way to get to a facility which 
    provides the service, this could be an issue.
    
    Requiring a husband's consent kind of makes my skin crawl.  What
    happens where there is a separation in progress, but no divorce yet? 
    Where the pregnancy was not caused by the husband?  This brings back
    all the old tapes of wives being the property of their husbands, unable
    to own property in their own name, and all the rest.  I can make my own
    decisions about my own life, thank you very much.
    
    Alison

but 'ren...

the law did not say that the consent of the fetus's father was required,
but that of the husband of the woman.

Clearly their interest is not in letting the father have a say, but in
letting a husband control his wife.

D!

    getting a husband's permission to have an abortion goes back to the
    outdated concept that a woman is the property of the man.
    
    in the state of Virginia, a woman  has to get her husband's permission
    to have a sterilization procedure.  a man does NOT have to get his
    wife's permission to have a sterilization procedure.  again, this
    illustrates the outdated concept that a woman is the property of the
    man.
    
    i would oppose all of the provisions of this law.  why wait when you
    have made up your mind to have the procedure?  it's not a decision
    arrived at lightly or in the blink of an eye.  24 hours is too long.
    
    there are many teenagers out there who would not tell their parents and
    then have to bear the baby, regardless of their personal situations.  i
    would rather my 14 year old daughter to have an abortion (if that's
    what she would choose) without my knowing than have her choices reduced
    if i would oppose an abortion.  what about those girls whose parents
    oppose the abortion?  her right to choose is being restricted.  options
    that could be considered are not allowed to her.
    
    chip away, indeed.  what with the latest stuff from washington dc, do
    you (rhetorical) really think that women are just going to sit around
    and let it happen?  women are going to unite at the grass roots level
    finally, it will be interesting and gratifying to watch and
    participate.
    
    sue

    Waiting 24 hours usually means that a patient must go to the hospital
    or clinic, sign in, and come back in 24 hours.  While this isn't a
    problem if there is a clinic or hospital near your home, for most of
    the nation this isn't the case.
    
    For example, some of the midwest states have one clinic in the entire
    state that performs abortions.  You may need to drive 6 or 8 hours to
    get there.  It adds additional costs to have to stay at a hotel.  
    
    And of course, if you are a minor who hasn't told her parents, try
    explaining to them that you'll be away overnight.
    
    Which brings us to parental consent.  There has been a precedence set
    that sexual matters remain between the minor and her doctor.  STDs can
    be treated without parental consent.  Birth control can be distributed
    without parental consent.  
    
    And in most cases there are no laws that prevent a minor from getting
    her ears pierced, an operation performed, and so on.  The reason that 
    parental consent is requried is to avoid litigation.
    
    These parental consent laws are not introduced by groups who typically
    support children's rights legislation.  They are nothing but chip-away
    bills to try to control women from making their own minds about whether
    they are ready to have a child.
    
    judy
    

    re.295
    
    Your point is well taken.  If the unborn had the capacity to make their
    wishes known it would be a very important vote indeed.
    
    At present such capacity does not exist, and the will of the unborn
    would mostly probably be voiced by one wit no direct knowledge or
    involvement.

    .294
    
    Of course parent consent can be a form of protection for the medical
    profession, but not always, for the daughter involved.  I know of
    many women (girls, kids) who cannot tell their parents anything for
    fear of what the parents would do to them.  They'd rather be runaways
    then go home and get beaten half to death for being pregnant.
    
    Maia
    

    
    And again,
    
    Not sure if that has just been changed, but up until a short while
    ago, a girl under age 18 had to get permission from *both* parents.
    
    I know of a young girl who has not seen her father for 15 years, has
    no contact with him whatsoever, does not know where he lives.  What is
    she to do if she gets pregnant?  And even more dangerous and covert,
    is the implication that the mother's (in this case) permission isn't
    enough or 'good enough.'
    
    argh.
    M.
    

    
    It seems to me that this law can  only serve one of two purposes.
    Either it is intended to make it more difficult for women to have
    abortions, or it is intended to make communication happen between women
    and their parents or husbands.  If the goal of this law is to restrict
    women's right to choose abortion, then under Roe V Wade, it should be
    struck down.  Also, because I happen to support a woman's right to
    choose, I think it should be struck down.  If the goal of this law
    is to make communication happen between a woman and her parents or her
    husband, then here again, I think it should be struck down.  I think
    that the government has no business trying to legislate familial
    communication.  More importanly, I don't see how it can possibly
    be successful in that.  I dare say that in families where there is
    good (or even fair) communication, no woman would have an abortion
    without talking about it with her husband or even with her parents.  If
    a minor is afraid to tell her parents she's pregnant (whether that fear
    is founded or not), a law is not likely to make a difference. 
    Depending on where she lives and the resources available to her, she
    will:  
      o Deny her pregnancy until it's too late
      o Run away from home
      o Have an unsafe, illegal abortion
      o Have a legal abortion in another state
      o Paddle her way through the bureaucracy to get a judge to declare
        her competent to have an abortion without her parents' consent.  A
        lawyer I know who works with underage women seeking abortions told me
        that if a young woman can get herself a lawyer (imagine a juniorhigh
        student calling a lawyer from the pay phone at school!) and get herself
        to court, the judge will declare her competent.
    
    So...  what it mainly boils down to is resources.  Women with access to
    private health care, women with access to the legal system, women with
    money can get safe, legal abortions.  Less powerful women (younger
    women, women of color, battered women who are too terrified of their
    husbands to let him know they're pregnant again, young women
    (children!) who are being tortured, raped, and/or otherwise terrorized
    by their parents) - these are the women who will have to live with the
    effects of laws like this one.  (More) powerful women can get around
    it.  So, in my opinion, no matter what the intent of a law like this,
    the effect will be to restrict many women's right to choose abortion.
    And that is unfair, and I think, illegal.  Of course, it's not everyday
    that something that is harmful to women is also illegal.
    
    Justine
    
    I think the best way to end (or at least greatly reduce) the number of
    abortions is to:
      1. Acknowledge the fact that many young people are sexually active
      2. Make contraception easy to get (see 1)
      3. Encourage discussion and learning about sexuality and its
         consequences (see 1)
      4. Encourage young women to see that it's ok to say no to
         sex, and it's also ok to say yes if you really want to, but
         you have to be responsible - I think a lot of women (of all
         ages) feel like it's "trampy" to be prepared for sex, to
         want it enough to actually get ready for it (see 1)
      5. Encourage discussion and learning about the incredible
         responsibility that parenthood entails.
    
    I'm sure there are other things, too, but these are what first came
    to mind.
      

    But Justine, you are missing the point with regards to your first point
    (that the law should be struck down under Roe v Wade.)
    
    The entire *purpose* of this bill is that it is in violation of Roe v
    Wade, so that it *will* get struck down, so that it can be appealed to
    the supreme court so that Roe v Wade can get overturned.
    
    Not passing this law is exactly what the right-to-lifers *wanted*! 
    (They admitted as much in the interview I heard on NPR this morning.)
    
    D!

    
    Well, I mentioned that because I'm hoping that Roe will stand, that it
    won't be overturned.  But actually, I am personally opposed to this
    law because I think it's wrong, and I also think that it won't do
    what its stated purpose is.
    
    Justine

re: .297

> the law did not say that the consent of the fetus's father was required,
> but that of the husband of the woman.
> 
> Clearly their interest is not in letting the father have a say, but in
> letting a husband control his wife.

	Legally speaking, in some (most? all?) states the husband of the
	woman *is* the father of the fetus, whether or not he was
	biologically involved.

	I am not kidding about this, nor is it a meaningless legal
	technicality.  I actually know a man who has been taken to court 
	for refusing to pay child support payments for a child his 
	estranged wife had two years or so after he last saw her (during 
	which time she was also refusing to sign the divorce papers).

	    Sharon

I quess my conservative side is comming out. I *do* think women have a right to
abortions. But I also feel this is not a free for all. A minor female is not
a woman. She is a child. She could not have any other surgery without her
parents consent. I do believe only one parent should be required and that a
court override be available.

I don't object to the 24 hour wait either. Sometimes it's better to wait till
the initial panic wears off. I don't see this stopping a lot of abortions.

As for the husband's consent, that's tough. It is the woman's body but he's
involved too. When you get to the point that it's not his child it really gets
sticky. Does a woman have the right to force a man to support a child or a man
have the right to force a woman to have one. geesh, I wish people weren't so
screwed up that they got into these situations but they (we) do repeatedly.

As for the intent of the law, it's to over turn Roe v Wade and no other reason.
I hate this! I do feel some limits are reasonable but I know that those who
are proposing them only want to take our choice away completely. liesl

    The only part of the law I wouldn't object strongly to is the
    parental consent part - for basically the reasons given by Liesl
    (it doesn't make a lot of sense to assume a child is competent to
    decide this issue but no other).  I understand the concerns that
    some parents will mistreat their children as a result of finding
    out about a pregnancy, but the same parents could mistreat their
    children on finding out about a "D" or a traffic accident. That
    mistreatment should be addressed on its own terms, not glossed
    over with regulations seeking to bypass the situation.

    I also agree that if the law requires both parents' consent, it's
    wrong. Either parent, or a legal guardian, or whoever is normally
    entitled to authorize medical procedures, should suffice. It
    should be treated no differently than any other medical procedure
    involving a minor.

    As for the 24 hour waiting period - there's no reason for it
    unless it can be shown to provide some positive benefit. It's
    clearly intended to encumber women seeking abortions (if it's
    inconvenient some won't bother, goes the thinking - like 24 hours
    waiting is more inconvenient than 7 more months pregnancy...).
    As to "waiting for the initial panic to wear off" - I doubt the
    law starts measuring the 24 hours from the time the woman learns
    of the pregnancy.

    Similarly, the husband consent regulation is unacceptable, because
    it treats the woman like a child. If the marital relationship is
    healthy, they'll have communicated about the subject; if it isn't,
    they're adults, and it's their business, not the state's.

    The 'parental consent' part of this law is one that will create a
    market for backstreet abortionists.  In many cases, teenage girls
    would rather risk death than have their parents find out they were
    pregnant.
    
    A couple whose daughter died as the result of a backstreet abortion
    (because she couldn't get a safe abortion without telling her parents)
    now lobby for abortion rights laws WITHOUT parental consent.
    
    They would rather have had a live daughter with a secret than the loss
    of a teenage daughter due to her fear of parental disapproval.
    
    As the parent of a 20 year old, I can see their point.  I would rather
    Ryan be allowed to keep some secret from me (and make his own decision
    even if I don't think he's ready for it) than to lose his life.

>    A couple whose daughter died as the result of a backstreet abortion
>    (because she couldn't get a safe abortion without telling her parents)
>    now lobby for abortion rights laws WITHOUT parental consent.
>    
>    They would rather have had a live daughter with a secret than the loss
>    of a teenage daughter due to her fear of parental disapproval.
 
Her name was Becky Bell.  And because I've read her mother's statements,
which Suzanne has acurately characterized here, I also oppose parental
consent laws.  Becky Bell died because of one.

DougO

    More to the point on the subject of parental consent:
    
    It seems as thought a lot of folks object to the spousal-consent part
    because that's reminiscent of the archaic idea that thee wife is the
    "property" of the husband.
    
    Yet at the same time it seems like a lot of folks aren't batting an
    eyelash at the idea that minors are the property of their parents!
    
    What's wrong with this picture?
    
    This is a great unresolved area of law, and one that receives
    comparatively little attention; just what *is* the status of a young
    person?  We're attacking the problem a bit here, a piece there (e.g.
    the question of whether to try minors who are charged with certain
    crimes as adults), but nobody seems to want to look at the whole
    picture.
    
    The process of a child's growing away from the parents and towards
    independence is a gradual one, and the law seems to have a hard time
    dealing with this sort of thing...
    
    --jim
    

 >     Yet at the same time it seems like a lot of folks aren't batting an
 >     eyelash at the idea that minors are the property of their parents!

    The concept is a bit more palatable if you substitute
    "responsibility" for "property". Maybe.

    I understand the dilemma, since maturity and the assumption of
    self-responsibility is hardly a step function, even if legal
    systems have difficulty treating it otherwise. A young woman at 17
    years 10 months is not guaranteed to be much less responsible than
    one who is 18 years 1 month - individual variance would would wash
    out differences of even several years in age.

    On the other hand, blanket abdication of parental (or other
    guardian) responsibility for all minors (say, down to 10 or 11) on
    this basis isn't a comfortable concept, either.

    The other part of the conundrum is: if abortion is to be treated
    like any other medical procedure for adult women, but is to be
    treated differently from other medical procedures for minor
    girls/young women, is that something people are comfortable with?
    Seems to go counter to philosophy, but may have pragmatic
    benefits. 
    
    P.S. not having any children, I've got no particular axe to grind
    either way here, so the parental consent issue is more academic to
    me than anything else. For what that's worth.

    It is strange to find myself arguing with pro-choicers. I guess I am
    solid enough in my belief that abortion is the best alternative in many
    cases that I can't believe that people would actually be unable to
    support the wishes of a pregnant female to terminate a pregnancy. But,
    that's what this is all about...
    
    I think it is patently wrong not to notify a parent when a child
    undergoes minor surgery. Moreover, I find it horrifying that the
    medical community waives parental responsibility so easily. But perhaps
    this is why many hospitals and HMO's won't touch abortion except to
    save a mother. There are probably some females who should not have
    abortions outside of a hospital environment where emergency care is
    immediately available. So, even now, we are not doing our best to
    provide for female medical needs.
    
    As for the 24 hour waiting period... there's GOT to be a loophole. The
    simplest one is to have a local doctor certify your pregnancy in
    writing, and to send notification along with a written request to the
    clinic. Within 24 hours of receipt, the abortion can then be performed.
    For those of you who think this is ridiculous, I suggest you ask
    someone else who has had an abortion... current practices require that
    you have medical proof of pregnancy. And that cute little EPT box
    doesn't cut it. So, the clinics are already requiring either two visits
    or a visit to a doctor before you come to them. Its positively dumb to
    require it, but if it gives the right-to-life group some peace of mind,
    it doesn't bother me.
    
    Some day, some where, hopefully here, a woman's fertility will not be
    so shrouded in mystery and religion that her decision to abort a fetus
    must be a hidden source of shame. Additionally, we may some day have the
    kind a supportive environment where parents sign consent forms for
    abortions with the same understanding as a consent form to cast a
    broken leg from a football game. There was risk, the worst happened,
    and medical care is now required. Probably wouldn't hurt if kids
    brought home consent forms for sexual activity either... 
    
         Dear Mom or Dad, 
              my body is ready to create life. Please acknowledge your
         responsibility to support me in the event of situations requiring
         surgical removal of life forms and forfeit rights to sue involved
         parties...
    
    Both of my parents would have signed it. Maybe that's why the shrouds
    of secrecy are so abhorrent to me. The couple who are out lobbying for
    non-parental consent laws strike me oddly. But I guess, as Justine
    says, its wrong to attempt to legislate morality, or, as someone else
    said, to ask the laws to force parents to do the right thing.
         
    
    On the other hand, there will always be Tom Krupinski's in the world.
    And some people would rather have their daughters die than have to
    consent to an abortion. (I'm not saying Tom feels that way.) But
    naively, I believe that many parents treasure their daughters lives and
    simply haven't thought it through. We need to educate them. Quickly. As
    the laws change.
    
    In the next ten years, a highly liberal law is going to be struck down.
    Piece by piece, states will modify the extent of a woman's "right to
    choose" to abort a fetus. Because the current law as it stands, offends
    too many members of the nation. It is too free, too simplistic, for the
    complex, controversial issue it legislates.
    
    I honestly believe that it is a mistake for vocal pro-choice advocates
    to take stands so far to the left of the pendulum that they cannot
    encompass the support of the waivering middle. When pro-choice
    advocates are too radical, the pro-life movement is strengthened. And
    vice versa.
    
    At times like these, it is critical that the pro-choice movement
    resound with the voice of reasonableness and sanity. Pro-choice
    advocates should be actively working to determine a middle ground so
    solid that no pro-life movement can triumph against it.
    
    Some people honestly believe that abortion is simply a woman's right.
    Disregarding the complexity of abortion and failing to reach an
    understanding with all of the parties involved is going to get a lot of
    women killed.                                         

    
    I am against any and all parental notification laws.
    
    I grew up in an extremely Catholic family, 8 children,
    BOTH parents EXTREMELY AGAINST abortion.  I can't even tell
    you how much!  And they loved us all VERY much, they loved
    ME very much.  They're wonderful people, but I don't agree
    with them on this one (we don't discuss it).
    
    I became sexually active at 16 and did use birth control, but
    did have a slight "scare" about the time I was 17.  I fortunately
    was NOT pregnant and, just as fortunately, NY state did NOT
    have this TERRIBLE, PUNITIVE (IMO) parental notification bill.
    
    If BOTH of these things were true, it would have TOTALLY
    DEVASTATED - at least for many years - the wonderful relationship
    I enjoyed with both my parents and continue to enjoy with my
    mother (my father is now dead).  Perhaps, being the smart kid
    I was, I could have sought an out-of-state abortion, but I can't
    really be sure, as everyone I knew around me was anti-abortion
    then (in this situation, I refuse to use the words "pro-life" -
    I choke on them, folks).
    
    Had I been pregnant and had they made make me carry to term,
    I feel I could never forgive them and would *always* have this
    *one* *huge* thing to hold *deeply* against them.
    
    Don't assume because a girl has a good relationship with
    her parents, she wouldn't suffer horribly from this bill
    should she become pregnant.
    
    If there is any *one* medical procedure that should be allowed
    without parental consent, this one is SURELY it!
    
    I do believe that girls under 18 should NOT be having babies!
    (This is personally speaking and I certainly don't intend to
    argue any 16 or 17 year old who is pregnant into aborting if
    she really wishes to have it - that is, or at least should be,
    her decision.)
    

    Cynically, I am not surprised that there are indications in this
    discussion that a medical abortion is unsafe for the woman.  It's
    a common misapprehension, encouraged by Some People.  It is far,
    far safer than pregnancy.
    
    In an old issue of "Ms.", they listed the name of every woman who
    had died as the result of an abortion for the previous year.  It
    was a list of one name.  The woman was an illegal immigrant who was
    too poor and too scared to have a legal abortion, so she'd gone to
    the traditional back alley abortionist.
    
    						Ann B.

    
    People with enough resources can get around just about any restriction.
    People with fewer resources are bound by them.  It seems to me that
    as long as abortion is a legal procedure, it needs to be equally
    available to all women (in this case, I'm using "woman" to mean any
    female who is capable of getting pregnant.)  Now I'm not saying that
    all women should have abortions, but I don't think it should be the
    medical establishment or the state standing at the gate letting some
    women in and keeping some women out.  It seems to me that the men who
    are in power now don't want women to have the right to choose
    abortion, but they don't (currently?) have the support to come right
    out and make it illegal, so they keep building these barriers, these
    obstacle courses for women to run through.  I think state legislators
    pass these parental consent laws because they worry about the
    communication they have with their own daughters.  I dare say that a
    state senator's daughter could probably muster the resources to have an
    abortion without Daddy's consent.  But who won't be able to afford it?
    Who won't be able to find a safe abortion?  Who is going to go through
    hell no matter what "choice" she makes because of all the restrictions
    placed on her?
    
    Justine

>    In an old issue of "Ms.", they listed the name of every woman who
>    had died as the result of an abortion for the previous year.  It
>    was a list of one name. 

	Where were the names of the those women who were aborted?
	I find it difficult to believe all of those aborted were male.

					Tom_K

    woman - an adult female human being.
    
    adult - one that is fully grown or mature, esp. a person who has
    attained legal age.
    
    						Ann B.

regarding parental consent...

no parental consent is required in the case of an emergency.  if a child
has appendicitis, and no parents are available to consent, the operation
will be performed *anyway* and consent dealt with later.

I don't know about you all, but I consider a young girl being pregnant
an emergency of life or death proportions.  If parents are not available
to give consent (unavailability includes unwillingness) then the operation
should not be withheld.

The difference between, say, a tonsilectomy and an abortion is that 99%
of parents, if told their child had tonsilitis requiring a tonsilectomy,
would consent.  However, in that remainder of the 1% case (such as
Christain Scientists) the state reserves the right give the child a
tonsilectomy if it is required, even without the parents' consent.
Because not giving a child the medical attention s/he needs is neglect
and illegal.

In other words, even in the case of other sorts of operations, parental
consent is required only when reasonable (ie: if the parents are 
available, and if they are willing to give their children what they
need.)  I think in many case, requiring consent in abortions is NOT
reasonable.

I do not support parental consent laws.

D!

Ms Broomhead forgot the following definitions from the anti-abortion brigade:

fetus, foetus:  an entity with rights from conception to birth

woman:  an entity with no rights

man:    one who sets laws for women, an owner

    
    
    						Ann B.
    						co-mod

    Please read the guidelines in .0 - this is starting slip into
    acrimony.
    
    Bonnie J
    co-mod

Sorry, Ann.  Sorry, Tom.  My blood ran hot in my brain and I took a swing
at Mr Krupinski, who is rightly voicing his opinions.  I'm sorry for reducing 
the level of this "debate" once more by attacking the messenger rather than 
debating the message.

...and now back to our regularly scheduled programs!

				Nigel

    re .315

    This is going to sound harsh, but it seems to me that a first step is
    to legally demonstrate that forcing a minor to carry an unwanted child
    to term must be considered child abuse or gross neglect. Otherwise,
    absence of parental notification in the case of one particular medical
    procedure, but not others, makes no sense.
    re .316
    
    Having had an abortion, I feel entitled to remind people that it is a
    medical procedure, and as such, is prone to complications. Just because
    women haven't died doesn't mean that no reproductive organs systems have
    been damaged since abortion became legal. If something can go wrong
    during a root canal or a tooth extraction, then something can go wrong
    during an abortion. 
    
        re .317
    
    I think it is fundamentally wrong to claim that "men" don't want women
    to have abortions. There too many women in the pro-life movement of
    their own free will for abortion to be simplified as a men vs. women
    thing. 
    
    At the far left, I do not personally believe that a fetus has
    any claim to rights. I'm as far from pro-life as a person can get.
    But at the same time, I hate to see abortion simplified by my
    standards, especially when I *KNOW* that very few people share my
    viewpoint about a fetus being an extractable parasitic life form.
    The reality is that a fetus is created by two people, and if it comes
    to term, it, and both its parents have certain legal rights and
    responsibilities, which are somewhat retroactive to conception, at
    birth.     
    
    I would like to hypothesize that wealthier, more educated people are
    more likely to be aware of legal rights and privileges, while poorer,
    less educated people are more likely to be bound by moral codes and
    principles. Making abortion legally viable does not do enough to
    empower America's underclass, any more than equal opportunity fully
    empowers minorities and veterans. Unless an Affirmative Action type
    position is taken on abortion and "choice", women of the underclass 
    will ALWAYS be less likely to abort.
    
    At the same time that current legislation does not do enough, in some
    ways, it does too much. The position that a woman has a "right" to
    abortion in private has some negative ramifications, because it
    condones women having abortions under duress; it is not truly a
    "pro-choice" legislation, but a pro-abortion one, and some of the women
    who have suffered the most from this pro-abortion legislation become
    the staunchest pro-life advocates in the country.
    
    Abortion is one of the more polarizing issues currently existing in
    this country. It is not simply a feminist issue, it is not "just" a
    question of women's rights. It touches on not only legal issues, but
    equally a host of financial, educational and moral ones. Addressing the
    legal issues alone is virtually criminal, and is a large reason why
    a radically "pro-choice" position is insupportable to many men AND
    women in this country, who consider abortion a "necessary evil".
    
    If abortion was truly a woman's right, there would be no shame or
    stigma to it. And there is, so it is not. Not at this time, in this
    country. Moreover, the majority of Americans are not willing to remove
    that stigma or burden from women. 
    
    I want to save women's access to abortion. But I do not believe that
    the best way to do this is to uphold a constitutional ruling that many,
    many *people*, not just men, find morally repugnant. 
    
    I strongly feel that the absolute best way to handle abortion is for
    ALL interested parties in both the government and private sector to
    fund an independent sociological committee to research and develop a
    body of laws and policies which could be implemented and supported by
    the majority of the nation. Obviously, I also believe that the
    committee itself needs representation from the full spectrum of
    viewpoints. But most importantly, it is VITAL that our laws address
    themselves toward a compromise solution. For the past 14 years we have
    seen that the current laws on abortion infuriate a portion of the
    population, a portion which is NOT strictly defined by sex. Without
    compromise, the pendulum will continue to swing back and forth
    throughout time. 
    
    To me, this is completely unacceptable.

    Regarding the "it's his child too" (for those cases where the husband
    is the biological father; talking about the legal father of a
    non-existant child seems to be pushing it...) argument for the husband
    having the right to force his wife to carry to term and give birth:
    
    If the husband does NOT want a baby, should he have the right to force
    his wife to have an abortion?
    
    If not, then clearly the real point is "abortion is bad; pregnancy is
    good", not the father's rights...
    
    Ray

	Apology accepted. Since you have edited your note to
	delete the personal comments, I have deleted my reply
	to them. 

					Tom_K

    Some time back, when Everett Koop was surgeon general, he was asked to
    look at the abortion issue.  He particularly was charged to examine the
    psychological and physical affects of abortion on women.  Alas for the
    governement, Koop who is anti-abortion, could find no medical reasons
    why abortion was bad, and in fact found many medical reasons in favor
    of abortion.  Koop wrote up the findings in his scrupulous, even-handed 
    manner.   Far as I know, the report has yet to be published.  I have
    only read excerpts.
    
    First trimester abortion is physically safer than a full term pregnancy.
    The younger the teenager, abortion becomes the best healthy choice. 
    This is particularly true for teenagers under 15.  Now, if a parent
    withoholds consent, is that child abuse?
    
    According to a letter I recently received from Gov Weld's office (gov
    of MA) the age of consent for *any operation except abortion* in MA is
    16.  Under 16, the consent of only one parent is required. Yet for
    abortion, the age of consent is 18. Pregnant teens under 18 in MA
    currently require the consent of both parents. I cannot see how the
    existing law helps families, helps teenagers, or extends otherwise held
    rights.  It is clearly legislation designed to limit access and I
    support the legislation suggested to replace it.
    
        Margaret

    
    re Margaret:
    
    I do believe that forcing a girl to carry a baby
    to term IS child abuse.
    

    Last night, I received a mailing from NARAL asking for my support in
    passing a national abortion rights bill.  The wording of the appeal led
    me to believe they have the desired legislation written, although it
    has not yet been submitted in Congress.  I tend to a moderate
    pro-choice position, and would like to know details of the proposed
    legislation before sending anything.  Anyone here know how to get (or
    have) specifics of the legislation?
    
    Alison 

    I believe that I have a rejoinder to the "give the fetus a vote"
    argument articulated a few days ago.
    
    As a parent, there are a number of instances where I let my children
    have a voice in decision-making.  The amount of weight given, and the
    issues which they have a voice in, change over time as the children
    grow up.  At no time, while they are living in my home, do they make
    all the decisions.  To allow them to do so would be irresponsible 
    parenting.
    
    An embryo has even fewer rights to "vote" in family decisions than a
    child.  As the possible parent, it is my responsibility to make
    decisions for the whole family unit.  And I don't believe that
    strangers have the knowledge, compassion, or interest to restrict
    the choices I make for my family. 
    
    Alison

    What upsets me about the whole issue is that being pro-choice doesn't
    necessarily mean pro-abortion.  We're not even fighting the same issue!
    
    Why don't the pro-life folks come up with some solutions for taking
    care of unwanted children?  For example, liberalize the adoption laws
    so that single folks, married folks, inter-racial marriages, lesbian
    and/or homosexual relationships, older folks (Presently, if you're over 
    45, forget it!) can adopt.  There are so many unwanted children in this
    world now, who is going to take care of them?  If it's left to society,
    then they are doomed because $'s will be continually cut from social
    services.  It's a classic case of the "haves" and "have-nots", and I
    think the world is practicing "Darwian socialism" (only some people are
    meant to survive).  Those who can afford an abortion, will always be
    able (hopefully) to find a way to obtain one - even if it means going
    to another country.  More poor women will die because they will try and
    self-abort.  Don't forget the horror stories of the 50's with women 
    trying to self-abort with knitting needles, lysol douches.