Holding Roses, Anti-Abortionists March Again Against Supreme Court Decision

Some may someday find not only do they need one, they won’t be able to get one legally.

WASHINGTON, January 19, 1975: On the second anniversary Wednesday of the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion, congressmen and senators will be showered with rice, roses and rhetoric.

The roses — each symbolizing an aborted fetus — will be presented by members of the National Right to Life Committee, Inc., thousands of whom will have a “March for Life” around the Capitol Wednesday afternoon after a morning of congressional visiting, according to Ray L. White, executive director of the committee.

Rice and other food will be distributed by members of still another anti-abortion group, American Citizens Concerned for Life, Inc. Executive director Thomas Mooney, 30, of Tacoma Park, explained that the food is an expression of his organization’s “concern for all life, both inside and outside the womb.” The food will be collected afterward for distribution abroad by CARE, Mooney said.

It is clear that the abortion debate is far from being settled by the Supreme Court decision.

On the eve of the abortion anniversary Tuesday, members of nearly 40 groups working to preserve the Supreme Court decision, will meet in the Senate Office Building. Congressmen and senators have been invited for a briefing and to hear Joseph L. Rauh, counsel of the Leadership Conference on Civil rights, speak on “Abortion as a Civil Right,” and Sen. Robert Packwood, R-Ore., on “Abortion: Outlook for the Future.”

This meeting is being coordinated by the National Abortion Rights Action League. A few days later, Jan. 25–27, NARAL will hold its annual convention at the Mayflower Hotel. The date was moved up from the fall because of the anniversary, said Karen Mulhauser, co-director of the Washington office.

“The 22nd is our day,” Said Mrs. Mulhauser. “It’s something for all of us to celebrate. Some of us might feel frustrated, but if they (the anti-abortion forces) can spend $35,000 in roses we can’t afford, we do need to get together and protect our gains.”

The March for Life program will begin at 1 p.m. on the Capitol steps, according to Nellie J. Gray, chairman of the march. Speakers are to include Sen. James Buckley, R-N.Y.; Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C.; Rep. Lindy Boggs, D-La.; Rep. Mario Biaggi, D-N.Y.; Rep. James L. Oberstar, D-Minn.; Rep. Lawrence McDonald, D-Ga,; and Del. Antonio Borja Won Pat, D-Guam. There will also be a number of clergymen, Miss Gray said.

On Wednesday morning, American Citizens Concerned for Life will have a prayer breakfast at the Statler-Hilton Hotel, with an hour of prayer and meditation on the theme, “For All God’s Children.” Mooney reports that Sen. Buckley and Rep. Albert Auie, R-Minn., will give meditations. “We’ve asked everyone to invite their congressmen to the breakfast, We are trying to keep it from being political; we want it to be spiritual,” Mooney said.

While anti-abortionists are readying for a massive assault on Capitol Hill, the majority of people who favor abortion are staying complacently at home, in the opinion of Pat Baldi, a nurse and Planned Parenthood counselor. “The polls go as high as 77 percent favoring abortion, including Catholics,” she notes.

But, “the average woman doesn’t think about abortion unless she is faced with an unwanted pregnancy. Most women don’t want to campaign for abortion because they don’t think they’ll need one.” She may wake up one day, Mrs. Baldi fears, and find that not only does she need an abortion, she won’t be able to get one legally.

Kenneth van Derhoef, the Seattle, Wash. attorney who is president of the the national Right to Life Committee, said that he expects Buckley will reintroduce his anti-abortion amendment Wednesday, and that it will be “substantially the same” as the one defeated last year. Buckley’s amendment would ban abortion except in cases where it is needed to save the mother’s life.

It was one of 45 abortion-related bills introduced in the 93rd Congress since the Supreme Court ruling. All but two imposed complete or partial restriction on the Supreme Court decision. Most were defeated or never came out of committee. But three passed. One provides that no doctors or hospitals can be required to perform abortions as a condition for receiving federal funds. A second forbids legal service attorneys from aiding clients who want non-therapeutic abortions and the third prohibits the use of foreign aid funds for abortion as a means of family planning.

One of the bills, which was cosponsored by then Rep. Gerald Ford in 1973, will be introduced this session. Rep. G. William Whitehurst, R-Va., has taken preliminary steps to put his bill back in the running. The bill would return the decision regarding abortions back to the states.

“The argument is often put for that women have a right to their own bodies and to determine the size of their families,” Whitehurst said. “This is true, but at the same time all rights imply certain responsibilities. These days we have many effective ways to prevent conception, both medical and surgical (sterilization), and I am in full agreement with their use.

“Once a woman is pregnant, however, there is another life and body to be concerned with. It is to see that the right to life is given proper consideration that I believe the states have a responsibility to step in.”

Werner Fornos, executive director of Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington, cites the Whitehorse amendment as “the most dangerous action to surface. The states rights position of the Whitehorse Resolution affords a legislator the chance to duck the issue on either side and to dispose of it once and for all as a national issue.”

Fornos, who refers to those supporting a woman’s right to make a decision about abortion with her physician as “pro-choice rather than pro-abortion,” said that he and his wife are “totally opposed to abortion. We are affluent enough to be able to take care of that (by having another child if necessary). But how can you put yourself in the shoes of some poor woman with 11 children she can’t care for? How can you make someone else’s decision for her?”

Planned Parenthood will be among the sponsoring groups for the Tuesday meeting in the Senate caucus room. Also included are the American Civil Liberties Union, the Religious Coalition for Abortion Rights, Zero Population Growth, Women’s Equity Action League, Medical Committee for Human Rights and others.

Although Planned Parenthood has maternal and child health clinics and counsels in contraception, its physicians do not perform abortions. Instead, Planned Parenthood recommends only seven of the 18 area clinics of the Northern Virginia Women’s Medical Center, the Women’s Medical Center, Washington Surgery Clinic, Sigma Reproductive Health Center in Rockville, Hillcrest Clinic, Pre-Term and the Women’s Clinic of the Washington Hospital Center.

Planned Parenthood also refers women to Birth Right, an organization that counsels and aides women with unwanted pregnancies who do not want abortions.

Birth Right is a service organization run by anti-abortionists. Another such facility will be open Tuesday. It will be called the Emergency Pregnancy Service Aid Centers and will be located at 4809 Greenbelt Road in College park. Chris Mooney, wife of the executive director of American Citizens Concerned for Life, Inc. is directing the service. She uses the plural “centers” because she hopes it will be the first of many.

According to Mooney, the centers will “try to help women with problem pregnancies, with money, housing and counseling. We will try to find a way to ameliorate her situation.” Mooney said that many people have donated money for the projects and others have offered to provide shelter for as long as needed.”

Mooney, whose group is eight months old, said it is “an alternative to the right to lifers. We are a little more liberal. There are two shows in town.”

Mooney was formerly director of the National Youth Pro-Life Coalition and before that a vice president of the national Student Association.

Fornos views a whole series of events since the Supreme Court decision as detrimental to the welfare of women, particularly poor women. His latest concern is a Department of health, Education and Welfare regulation, not yet finalized, that would reduce federal sharing on medicaid abortions to as low as 50 percent (the states would pay the other 50 percent). HEW has been paying as high as 90 percent.

Fornos does not think the states have the money to pick up the tab. It is estimated that between $40 and $50 million a year of both federal and state monies pay for medicaid abortions.

Dr. Carl Shultz, director of the Office of Population Affairs for HEW, said the regulations are being changed “to bring HEW in line with Congressional intent.” Abortions would be removed from the category of family planning, where the federal government pays up to 90 percent, to that of medical care, for which it pays between 50 and 83 percent, he said.

It has been charged that the HEW ruling will discriminate against poor women, but Shultz does “not believe it will make a significant difference.” He expects the states to pay for medicaid abortions just as they now pay for other surgical procedures.

Anti-abortionists, meanwhile, are certain this will be the year when Congress passes some sort of “support for human life” amendment which will nullify the Supreme Court decision.

[This article originally appeared in The Washington Star-News, January 19, 1975 as Abortion Is Still a Fighting Word for the U.S. #2 in a collection of more than 100 newspaper articles by Judy Flander from the second wave of the Women’s Movement reflecting the fervor and ingenuity of the women who rode the wave.]