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'Operation Rescue' workers and
pro-choice activists struggle in the
battle over reproductive rights

A member of "Operation Rescue" (left) prays during the conflict at Oak Park, while a member of CDAR mocks him.

Taking9it
Photos by Robin Loznak
Story by Liz Paige

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The battle over reproductive rights
continues.
Hundreds of thousands of women
are expected in Washington D.C. to-
morrow for the March for Women's
Equality and Women's Lives.
Originally, the march was intended
to alert President George Bush that his
anti-abortion views were contrary to
the views of the majority of Ameri-
cans. But the march, sponsored by the
National Organization of Women,
Planned Parenthood and the Ameri-
can Civil Liberties Union, has since
taken on a more urgent call.
The demonstration will coincide
with the Supreme Court's hearing of
arguments on Webster v. Reproduc-
tive Health Services. The 1986 Mis-
souri law in question in the case cur-
rently restricts abortions in the state by
limiting the availability of public

money and buildings for counseling
and performing abortions after the 20th
week of pregnancy.
Some proponents of the march on
Washington have said that "no dem-
onstration in the 1980s has had the
potential to be so crucial in its imme-
diate impact upon the Supreme Court."
(Against the Current Magazine).
According to Justice Harry Blackmun,
there is a "good chance" that the Su-
preme Court will overturn the 1973
Roe v. Wade decision which legalized
abortion within the next few months.
The Justice Department under
President Reagan, in a brief filed No-
vember 10, 1988, told the Supreme
Court that the Missouri case presented
"an appropriate time" for overruling
Roe v. Wade.
But the Supreme Court has turned
back several similar challenges in the

last decade, and in fact the court could
decide on most of the specific issues in
the Webster case in Missouri's favor,
without actually overturning the 1973
decision. The Webster decision is
expected some time in June.
For the last sixteen years, anti-
abortion activists have been working
to limit access to abortion through
various restrictions passed at the fed-
eral, state and municipal levels. Those
most affected by current restrictions
on abortion are primarily poor women
and, disproportionately, women of
color. In 1976 the Hyde Amendment
ended federally-funded abortions for
poor women under Medicaid, cutting
off 300,000 abortions annually. This
amendment, ruled constitutional by
the Supreme Court in 1980, is the most
far-reaching restrictions thus passed
See Cover Story, Page 13

PAGE 10 WEEKEND/ APRIL 7,1989

WEEKEND/ APRIL. 7,1989