The Hypocrisy of a 20 Week Ban

by Joanna Blotner
RCRC Public Policy Manager

I am proud of the rich theology of my Jewish faith which has for millennia firmly stood in solidarity with a woman who faces a problem pregnancy, valuing her health, inherent dignity, and physical and mental well being above all else. Like most Americans, I believe that it is critically important for a woman to have access to safe, legal, affordable and compassionate abortion care. I further believe that my faith requires me to work to preserve and expand access to this care, standing in solidarity with all women and families facing difficult emotional and economic circumstances surrounding a pregnancy at any stage.

This is why I am so deeply disturbed by the actions of so many Members of Congress seeking to ban access to abortion care and services after 20 weeks gestation – a time at which no woman makes the decision to end a pregnancy lightly.

Proponents of H.R.1797, the “Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act,” prioritize the potential life of a fetus over that of a woman, a position almost always in in conflict with centuries of established Jewish law. No woman should be forced to give birth against her will. This is an unconscionable burden to ask of a woman – particularly if she has been informed late in her pregnancy that the fetus she carries is not viable and that continuing the pregnancy will pose a risk to her health, as was the case of a dear friend of mine a few years ago.

It is telling that Congressman Trent Franks (R-AZ) did not make even a single reference to a woman, her family, or her situation in a press release announcing that he would be expanding the focus of H.R.1797 from the District of Columbia to a nationwide ban. It is also deeply ironic that of the 185 cosponsors of this legislation, only 56 voted to alleviate harm and pain to women and families by helping pass the Violence Against Women Act earlier this year. In 2009, when presented with the opportunity to expand the Children’s Health Insurance Program and support children experiencing pain due to illness or injury, of those cosponsors in Congress at the time, 81% chose to DENY protection and care to those children in need. VAWA and CHIP are the types of policies that affirm, value, protect and support healthy families; these are the types of policies rejected by H.R.1797′s supporters. The hypocrisy is glaring – and shameful.

Congressman Franks and his allies supporting this bill, like all Americans, are free to have and share their own religious beliefs about issues related to pregnancy and parenting. Liberty is an American value. However, we must not fool ourselves into thinking this bill seeks to protect women, children or families, as its supporters claim. H.R. 1797 is a clear attempt to impose one extreme and uncompromising religious belief about abortion on the whole nation, without taking into consideration the often complex circumstances in which the decision to end a pregnancy is being made. It is a gross violation of Constitutionally protected liberties and religious freedom.

H.R. 1797 privileges the pain that a fetus might feel over the physical pain and mental anguish a woman has in making the difficult decision to terminate a pregnancy. That decision, no matter the stage of the pregnancy, should be left to a woman in consultation with her family, her doctor, and her faith – not politicians bent on forcing a narrow religious view on all Americans.

Emergency Contraception Ruling: Justice Over Politics

Nicole Miller
RCRC Intern

As a young person just starting to explore my own role in the political process, I can tell you that most of what I see regarding my own rights as a women is completely disheartening. I want to vote for and support the people that I think will be good for the economy and advocate for the issues I care about, yet again and again the challenge I confront is a candidate’s stance on my rights as a woman to control decisions regarding my body. Frankly, this shouldn’t have to be a concern for me.  It should be a given that, as a citizen and as a human being, my right to privately make decisions that are best for me, my body and my family are protected. I want to see this issue move out of the ‘political wrestling ring’ and be placed where it belongs: with the individual.

This is why I’m so excited to finally see justice and reason winning out over politics, religious extremism and partisanship as access to emergency contraception is finally – and rightfully – being granted. Thanks to a recent ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2^nd Circuit, the two-pill version of emergency contraception will be available to individuals without proof of age requirements or a prescription. In doing so, the Court of Appeals sided with the historic ruling of US District Court Judge Korman, who ruled that the Administration’s opposition to emergency contraception was “politically motivated and scientifically unjust.” The Court of Appeals unfortunately agreed to the Administration’s request to continue blocking availability of the one-pill version of emergency contraception.

Access is critical, because emergency contraception is most effective when used within 24 hours of birth control failure. Obstacles such as prescriptions and age-restrictions prevent women and their partners from getting emergency contraception in time for it to work best.  While the FDA attempted to compromise on age restrictions by lowering to 15, Judge Korman and the 2^nd Circuit court’s ruling recognized that it is ridiculous to assume that most 15 year old women will have valid, legal forms of identification. Additionally, this measure fails to reconcile the issue of women of any age who don’t have identification cards, or who work difficult schedules and are unable to get to a doctor on short notice for a prescription and subsequently to a store during pharmacy hours.  Thankfully, the appeals court ruling recognizes that limiting access to a safe form of birth control that works within a short time limit simply makes no sense. and

This is a tremendous win for all who believe that the government’s role should be to increase—not block—access to safe and effective forms of birth control. Family planning is a moral good and fundamental right that every woman, no matter her age, should be able to control for herself.

Nicole Miller was an intern in our office this month. She attends university in North Carolina and is originally from the DC area.

Frank’s Dangerous, Nationwide 20-Week Abortion Ban Proposal

Rev. Rob Keithan
RCRC Director of Public Policy

I’m currently sitting in a hearing called by Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) for his H.R. 1797, the “District of Columbia Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act,” which would expand nationwide his proposed 20-week abortion ban for the District of Columbia. I’m here on behalf of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, but also on behalf of the millions of women and families whose lives would be dramatically impacted by this terrible bill.

Rep. Franks, like many other arch-conservatives and religious extremists, have been using the grisly case of Kermit Gosnell to push for more restrictions to compassionate abortion care. Restricting access to abortion – in some cases, making it so difficult to access as to make it impossible to obtain – actually creates more Gosnell’s, not less. H.R. 1797 is a dangerous intrusion into the most personal of decisions that a woman can make, a decision that politicians towing a narrow, religiously- motivated line should not be making for them.

It is necessary as faith leaders to have the humility to see God’s hand at work in people’s lives, and to make sure that they have the resources they need to effectuate the decisions that are best for them and their families. Banning abortion outright at 20 weeks, with no exceptions, is a crass political move to control the lives of people who are making decisions in complex situations. Such a move chafes at our pastoral responsibilities and at our deep faith in our constitutionally-protected religious liberty.

RCRC wrote the letter below, signed by a broad list of religious organizations, and delivered it to members of the House Judiciary Committee. I hope you’ll strongly consider reaching out to your Member of Congress to oppose this oppressive measure.

___________ 

May 23, 2013

Dear Representative,

We, the undersigned national religious groups, urge you to oppose H.R.1797, the “District of Columbia Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act” sponsored by Representative Trent Franks (R-AZ), which would create a nationwide ban on access to abortion care 20 weeks after fertilization, with no exceptions in cases of rape, incest or fetal anomalies. It explicitly bans later abortion care for a woman whose mental health would threaten her life or her health. We stand united across our faith traditions in opposing this extreme legislation.   

Proponents of this bill have cited the Kermit Gosnell case as a reason to push this intrusive policy, but the fact is that the lack of access to safe and affordable abortion care is precisely the circumstance that drove women to an unscrupulous person like Gosnell, as it did to so many women before Roe v. Wade.  The existence of his clinic is a ghastly warning sign of what happens when abortion is so restricted and expensive that a woman in need feels that she has nowhere else to turn.

A family with a wanted pregnancy that goes terribly wrong is confronted with awful decisions that none of us ever want to face.  Our religious values call us to offer compassion, support, and respect to a woman and her family facing these difficult circumstances. H.R.1797will only make a challenging situation worse.   When a woman needs an abortion, it is critically important that she have access to safe and legal care.

It is telling that Representative Franks, in a press release announcing that he would be expanding the focus of H.R.1797 from the District of Columbia to a nationwide ban, does not make even a single reference to a woman, her family, or her situation. 

Like all Americans, Rep. Franks is free to have and share his own religious beliefs about issues related to pregnancy and parenting. Liberty is an American value. However, H.R.1797 is a clear attempt to impose one particular religious belief on the whole nation, and thus represents a gross violation of the freedom to which every American is entitled by the Constitution. The proper role of government in the United States is not to impose one set of religious views on everyone, but to protect each person’s right and ability to make decisions according to their own beliefs and values. 

We believe—and Americans, including people of faith, overwhelmingly agree—that the decision to end a pregnancy is best left to a woman in consultation with her family, her doctor, and her faith. Our laws should support and safeguard a woman’s health – not deny access to care. Please show compassion for women and respect for religious liberty by opposing HR 1797.

In faith,  

Anti-Defamation League
Catholics for Choice
Disciples Justice Action Network
Hadassah, The Women’s Zionist Organization of America, Inc.
Jewish Council for Public Affairs
Methodist Federation for Social Action
Metropolitan Community Churches
Muslims for Progressive Values
National Council of Jewish Women
Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
Religious Institute
Union of Reform Judaism
Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations
Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation
United Church of Christ, Justice and Witness Ministries

  

Emergency Contraception: A Victory for Women and Religious Freedom

We don’t typically share press releases on the RCRC blog, but we’re making an exception because we’re so excited about today’s ruling by a Federal Court which requires that emergency contraception be made available over the counter.

The case, which has been going on for many years, was brought by our friends at the Center for Reproductive Rights. The ruling requires that emergency contraception be made available over the counter within 30 days. Reproductive justice calls us work to create an environment where all people have access to everything they need to make decisions about their reproductive and sexual lives according to their own conscience and faith. This ruling is a huge step forward in recognizing the moral agency of women and couples to decide whether and/or when to have children.

It’s about time.

___________________

April 4, 2013 — The Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC) applauds today’s Federal Court decision to increase access to emergency contraception. The ruling gives every woman and couple easier access to one more safe and effective birth control option. It also represents a clear—albeit long-delayed—triumph of science and public health over politics and moral policing.    

“This ruling is both a victory for women and a victory for religious freedom,” said RCRC Director of Public Policy Rev. Rob Keithan.  “The government’s role in reproductive healthcare should be to respect religious differences and protect access to options, not to impose one particular religious viewpoint and limit opportunities because of it. Every person should be able to make healthcare decisions according to their own beliefs and values.”

The ruling, from a case brought against the federal government by the Center for Reproductive Rights, improves access to safe, reliable contraception, which is an essential part of basic reproductive healthcare for women.

“Our commitment to reproductive justice calls us to ensure that a woman has access to  all the resources she needs to take care of herself and her family, including emergency contraception. RCRC views access to emergency contraception—and to contraception generally—as a moral imperative that benefits women, families, and society overall.” said Keithan.

Ain’t I Woman? Yes, I Am.

by Angela Ferrell-Zabala
Director of Field Operations, RCRC

It was a picture of Shirley Chisholm that started my obsession with old pictures of women of color. She doesn’t have the cheekbones of Lena Horne, but to me she is the absolute picture of beauty. Perhaps not by society’s typical standards, but she was unyielding courage and intelligence personified. Mostly she was life personified… LIFE! And for me, she was everything.

Like many women of color, who I am can be defined in many ways. There’s a little bit of Irish and Cherokee on my family tree several generations back, but for many years I presented solely to the world as a young black woman, a black face flattened by outside cultural norms and identities. My identity, however, is much richer than the simple fact of my skin color. Marriage has grafted Ukrainian, Puerto Rican and Japanese branches onto my family tree and my childhood blossomed with borsht, salsa music and sushi. It wasn’t until middle school that I started to address this cognitive dissonance and ask myself who I am as a woman – and a black woman – in this family made up of many cultures.

Kids will look for anything to tease you about. For me, it was the music I listened to and the way I spoke that offered me up for derision as not being black enough. So I questioned my blackness, something I would do for many years until I started to see the truer picture of who I am as a woman, and as a black woman.

It was those pictures of black women – strong, talented, beautiful, complicated women – that gave me a road map to owning my own history, and a shared history.

Joining Shirley are Eartha, Ella, Billie, Dinah, and dozens of starlets who didn’t make the big time. And there’s Angela Davis (to whom I owe my name), and Sojourner Truth, and Maya Angelou. There’s Cathay Williams, who was the first black woman to enlist in the U.S. Army; she served as a Buffalo soldier after the Civil War under the pseudonym William Cathay, presenting as a man in order to serve our country. There’s Constance Baker Motley, a civil rights activist, lawyer, judge and state senator who wrote the original complaint for the Brown v. Board of Education, and was the first black woman to argue a case in front of the Supreme Court. And there’s Mary Church Terrell, who was one of the first black women to attain a college degree, and who worked on civil rights issues alongside Frederick Douglas, who was a member of the National American Women Suffrage Association, and a founder of the NAACP.

There are my aunts, grandmothers stretching back generations (including my maternal grandmother who raised eight boys and two girls on her own) and my mother – my beautiful, strong mother – all smiling back at me in pictures. All these women, from world famous to famous just to me, have taught me an incredibly valuable lesson: there is nothing about being a woman of color that makes me ‘less than.’ Nothing. Where I get my strength and my identity is not from a narrow definition of what others think, but from the strong women I come from.

In fact, all those influences – culinary and musical, literary and cultural, familial and spiritual – are good, rich, glittering gifts that only add to me. They shine on me, and through me. There is not one thing about those influences, coupled with my own unique experiences, that does anything but add to me. It’s a history that lays about my shoulders and enfolds me. The voices of those women – sometimes just one, often in concert – are in my head when I’m phone banking in Florida, or organizing in Mississippi, or on a conference call with activists in Ohio and Wisconsin. Those voices whisper wisdom to me as I parent my 11 y.o. twins with my wife, and as I continue to grow myself.

As we begin Black History Month, I have the words of Rumi in my head, “Maybe you are searching among branches for what only appears in the roots.”

I am grateful for the roots – the grounding – of all those women in my life… because they make the tree that I am.

Choose Life

by Rev. Elizabeth Kaeton
RCRC Board Member

Choose life.

That’s a religious mandate for many people of many different expressions of faith.

I don’t know about you, but I am sick and tired of being sick and tired of being clobbered by scripture.  I am sick unto death of having this particular piece of scripture used – by some folks – as a guilt trip when I explain to some that I work for reproductive justice.

“But, what about what scripture says?” they ask. You know, ‘Choose LIFE’?”

I’ve made a New Year’s resolution to take back scripture from the misuse and abuse of people who choose to use it for their own purposes. So, what I’m about to offer are a few of my thoughts about “Choose Life” as I reflect on the 40th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade.

Choose life.  Choose what is good. Choose what is right. For you. For your life.

In a very short, two-words sentence, we are asked to cherish the two great gifts of the human enterprise: free will and the goodness of our creation.

“Choose life.” Not, “Let someone else make the choice for you.” Not, “This is what life is and when it begins and how I define it for you.”

No, the directive is simply, “Choose life.” We are invited to discover the wonder and mystery and complexity of that simple sentence the rest of our whole lives.

Choose what gives you life. What enhances your life. What contributes to your life. For, in so doing, we contribute to the well being of the rest of the world.

Unfortunately, the ability for an individual – especially women – to define and decide what is good for their life is being limited by the definitions and decisions of others.

We have been in this place before.  

In June of 1969, a 21-year-old Texas woman named Norma McCorvey found herself pregnant for the third time. She had left home at the age of 14 and had lost custody of her first child to her mother and had placed her second child for adoption. She was living in Louisiana with her father and working several low-paying jobs.

She grew despondent and depressed and desperate as she began to understand that she would be unemployable as a young mother with a child and no support. Moving back to Texas seemed the only option left open to her. At least there she could claim she had been raped and be allowed to have an abortion. At least, that’s what her friends told her.

Due to lack of documentation and evidence of rape, her scheme did not work. She tried to obtain an illegal abortion at several clinics she and her friends knew, but found that the police had closed them down. The only other option was to seek out non-medical, non-professional “back alley” abortion – a procedure performed by persons either lacking the necessary skills or in an environment lacking the minimal medical standards or both.

It is important to know that, according to a 2002 study by Planned Parenthood, estimates of the annual number of illegal abortions in the United states during the 1950s and 1960s range from 200,00 to 1.2 million. During that same period of time, as many as 5,000 American women died annually as a direct result of unsafe abortions.

Indeed, Leslie Reagan chronicles many of these stories in her book, “When Abortion Was A Crime.” Women often tried to induce abortion or cause a miscarriage by throwing themselves down stairs or inflicting violence on themselves. They ingested, douched with or inserted into themselves a chilling variety of chemicals and toxins – from bleach to potassium permanganate to turpentine to gunpowder and whiskey. Knitting needles, crochet hooks, scissors and coat hangers were all tools used by women who had not choice but to resort to these means.

As Frederica Matthews-Green is quoted as saying, “No woman wants an abortion as she wants an ice cream cone or a Porsche. She wants an abortion as an animal caught in a trap wants to gnaw off its own leg.”

Every young woman, no matter her age, knew a story about a woman – a friend or a friend of the cousin of a distant relative – who had had an abortion. Rarely was the outcome good – which included either the death of the woman or her inability to conceive. Seeking to choose life for herself and her family, McCorvey did seek out legal assistance, turning to attorneys Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington. Ultimately, she gave birth to the child three years before the U.S. Supreme Court finally heard the case.

On January 22, 1973, Roe (AKA Norma McCorvey) v. Wade (AKA Henry Wade, Dallas County DA) became an historical, landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court on the issue of abortion.  The Court ruled 7-2 that a right to privacy under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment extended to a woman’s decision to have an abortion, but that right must be balanced against the state’s two legitimate interests in regulating abortions: protecting prenatal life and protecting women’s health.

In the midst of the tension of these two concerns, the country was plunged into the midst of a passionate national debate which has hardly abated over the last 40 years.

Meanwhile, Norma McCorvey went on with her life, choosing to live quietly and privately with her long-time life partner, Connie Gonzales. In 1995, she was befriended by evangelical minister Flip Benham and was baptized by him in August of that year. She also publicly announced her remorse for her involvement in Roe v. Wade and became an advocate of Operation Rescue’s campaign to make abortion illegal.

She changed her mind. She made another choice. I still shake my head whenever I hear people who are opposed to abortion defend the change of her choice, claim that it is “a woman’s prerogative” to change her mind. They say this without any evidence of an awareness of the irony of that statement.

Twenty-two years after Roe v. Wade, Norma McCorvey made a different choice about the life-altering choice of abortion.  She was able to make that choice because she was free – she had the civil and spiritual right – to make another choice. How ironic that her choice includes restricting the rights of others to Choose Life for themselves.

I confess that the logic of that position completely escapes me. When former Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin discovered that the child she was carrying had Trisomy-21 – a condition formerly known as Down’s Syndrome – she reports that she briefly considered abortion, but then proudly states that she “chose life.”

Yes, she chose the life that was best for her, which included the choice to continue with her pregnancy. However, she and others like her seem not to understand that their choices do not include limiting the choices of other women to choose life for themselves in the way that is best defined for them.

Choose life. That’s why we’re here. That’s why we do this work. We choose to do this work because we want to guarantee that a woman has a choice about what happens to her body. We choose to do this work because we want to guarantee that a woman has a choice about what happens to her family. We choose to do this work because we want to insure that a woman has a choice about her own future. We choose to do this work because we know that what we do is life-giving to millions of women in this country and around the world. Can somebody here give me an “amen?”

According to the World Health Organization, in countries where abortion remains unsafe it is the leading cause of maternal mortality, accounting for 78,000 of the 600,000 annual pregnancy-related deaths worldwide.

According to the Alan Guttmacher Instituted, approximately 219 women die worldwide each day from an unsafe abortion.  219. Women. Worldwide. Every. Day.

Six months after abortion was legalized in Guyana in 1995, admissions for septic and incomplete abortion dropped by 41%. One year after Romania legalized abortion in 1990, its abortion-related mortality fell from 142 to 47 deaths per 100,000 live births.

Legalization of abortion allows women to obtain timely abortions, thereby reducing the risk of complications. In 1970, one in four abortions in the United States took place after 13 weeks gestation. Today, according to the Guttmacher Institute, approximately 88-92% of all abortions in the US take place before the end of the first trimester.

To keep abortion safe and legal for women is to choose life. It is choosing life for women whose life choices are already limited by poverty, unemployment, substandard housing or homelessness, limited access to quality education and few quality health care options.

For those who would choose to reduce or limit the number of abortions, I ask that you consider this choice: Put down your placards and posters that carry grotesque images and dire scriptural judgments and warnings. Seek not to pass laws to make abortion illegal.

Choose instead to change the reasons women have abortions. Work to end poverty. Work to improve education. Work to create jobs. Work to improve health care. Make these choices and you will improve the choices women have and reduce the need for abortion.

Work to repeal the Hyde Amendment which prevents the very women who need it most – women who live in desperate poverty like Norma McCorvey once did and have no support much less resources for themselves and their families – from attaining reproductive justice.

Work to make real the acceptance of contraception as a normal part of a woman’s preventative health care. Can somebody PLEASE tell me why we are still having this conversation in the year 2013?

Work to dismantle the underlying oppressive, interlocking systems of racism and sexism and heterosexisms, so that – to paraphrase the great words of Martin Luther King, Jr., whose spirit continues to guide us and lead us in all matters of justice – a woman’s life may be judged, not by the color of her skin or the contents of her uterus, but on the content of her character.

Choose to understand that, long before a collection of cells grows into and is born and takes that first breath of life and becomes a person, the pregnant woman in whose body those cells gathered and grew was and is a living person whose dignity and free will and civil rights must be respected.

Her life, her intelligence, her integrity, her ability to make choices for herself and her family, her status as a citizen of these United States must be respected, and her freedoms must not be denied.

The choice is really simple: Choose life.

We choose life when we choose to walk together in Love – respecting the dignity of every human being.

We choose life when we choose to walk together in justice – insuring that the civil and spiritual and religious right of free will is protected and guaranteed for all.   

We choose life when we choose to walk together in action – moving ourselves out of our complacency and past our illusions of security.

Choose life, my sisters and brothers, that we may walk together as children of God.

And let all God’s children say, “Amen.”

(This post was originally delivered as a sermon by Rev. Elizabeth Kaeton as part of “Walking Together: Love, Justice, Action,” an interfaith service to welcome, thank and bless RCRC’s friends in Congress, the returning administration, and their staffs on January 20, 2013. It was previously posted on Rev. Kaeton’s own blog at http://telling-secrets.blogspot.com/2013/01/choose-life.html.) 

We Remember Roe by Taking Action

Tuesday, January 22, is the 40th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the landmark case which established a legal right to abortion under certain conditions. While Roe has helped many individuals and couples make their own decisions about parenting, its limited scope means that far too many women—often, but not always, for economic reasons—still lack meaningful access to the full range of reproductive healthcare options.

One obstacle to care for women is the Hyde Amendment, which blocks any Federal funding for abortions. For many women, government-funded programs are the only access they have to health care in general, and reproductive care specifically. It’s time our government started to trust women again.

President Obama will soon send his yearly federal budget to Congress and he has a decision to make: he can withhold abortion coverage from women who get their insurance or health care through the Federal government, or he can lift the restrictions on coverage of abortion care. Here at the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, we are commemorating Roe by joining other organizations in taking action as part of Trust Women Week.

Please act now! Ask President Obama to send a budget to Congress that ends the unnecessary and unfair restrictions on coverage of abortion care.

At the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, we believe that it is utterly unacceptable—and in fact immoral—for our national policies to single out a group of women for the sole purpose of denying access to reproductive healthcare. Instead, we believe that our lawmakers should be working to ensure that all people can make healthcare and other personal decisions according to their own conscience and values. It should not be the role of government to limit options, but to provide resources—especially for low-income women and other groups with limited options.

This is about compassion. This is about conscience. This is about justice.