All out for rights!
1986 1986-03Read it in the scan (PDF at ETOL), page 1 →
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Before safe birth control devices were available, women were-and still are in many parts of the world-virtual slaves to their reproductive systems.
Families with 10 children or more were common. Women who gave birth year after year died young. Others sought illegal abortions. Thousands lost their lives from unsanitary, botched abortions.
Those who would outlaw abortion seek to send women back to such conditions. After outlawing abortion they would out -law birth control.
Birth control and safe legal abortion give women greater freedom and control over their lives.
National Organization for Women President Ellie Smeal told the national news media how seriously the women's movement takes the abortion issue:
"I believe that every woman and every man who cares about a quality of life worth fighting for had better stand up, while they can still stand up, and join with us in a fight to keep abortion and birth control safe and legal. That's why I am calling a mass mobilization in the spring of 1986 for abortion and birth control. I hope hundreds of thousands of people come here to Washington, but that will be only the first of many marches and many acts."
Socialist Action applauds NOW and urges all our readers to join the Marches for Women's Lives on March 9 and 16 in Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles.
These actions represent the first require -ment of an effective women's rights strategy-mass action. A second requirement is independence. With Con gressional elections in the fall, there is enormous pressure to channel women's anger, energy, and their organizations into the electoral campaigns of those who give lip-service to women's rights issues.
Backing capitalist candidates, especially the Democratic Party "feminists," proved fatal to the fight for the Equal Rights Amendment in 1982. A burgeoning mass movement was turned into an auxiliary to the Democratic Party. The biggest challenge to the women's movement today is to avoid making that same mistake.
Keep abortion safe and legal! Abortion is a woman's right to choose!