Nat'l Organization for Women calls for giant mobilization in Spring 1992

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success.

Over 500,000 people demonstrated in the streets of Washington, D.C., that day. They marched against the budget cuts of the Reagan administration, against tax giveaways to the rich, and in support of legislation protecting workers' rights and safety.

The first Solidarity Day came on the heels of then-President Ronald Reagan's firing of 12,000 air traffic controllers (PATCO) in 1981 simply for exercising their right to strike.

A militant contingent of PATCO members received a tremendous response to their chants of "Ronald Reagan take a hike, PATCO has the right to strike!" To this day, only two modern industrial nations fire striking workers—the United States and South Africa.

The 1981 Solidarity Day demonstration raised hopes that the labor movement was returning to its past traditions of militancy. Lane Kirkland, head of the labor federation, gave a stirring speech recalling that "we have come too far, struggled too long, sacrificed too much, and have too much left to continued on page 5 "We are launching a campaign of defiance because we are not going to let women die," declared Eleanor Smeal, past president of the National Organization for Women. She was speaking at the annual NOW conference, in New York City, July Over 2000 feminists attended the national gathering, which marked NOW's 25th anniversary. A large banner at the front of the hall proclaimed the conference theme, "Empowering Women"

This gathering, however, was not a celebration of the accomplishments of the last 25 years so much as a strong rebuke to the new wave of attacks on women's rights. Recent Supreme Court decisions, coupled with restrictive anti-abortion laws passed in several states, made the delegates quite aware that women's right to safe, legal abortion has been seriously undermined and is in danger of being outlawed altogether.

The main resolution backed by the NOW leadership, "We Won't Go Back," contained a six-point program to defend abortion rights. The program includes overturning the Supreme Court's "gag rule" against women's health clinics, defeating the nomination of Clarence Thomas to the Court, recruiting and running "feminist" candidates in upcoming elections, and civil disobedience.

March on Washington, D.C.

Most significantly, the resolution called for the "largest march on Washington in our nation's history in the spring of 1992." It also called for actions on "campuses and in cities big and small and in states" this fall to build toward the spring mobilization.

The call for such a march is an aggressive step bY NOW. To put a million people in the streets of Washington, as NOW Executive Vice President Patricia Ireland promised in her keynote speech, would be an unprecedented display of the solidarity and strength of the women's liberation The building actions necessary to accomplish this goal would re-energize the movement and provide a focal point for pro-choice organizing nationwide. A mobilization of such historic proportions would take the women's movement off the defensive and add forces to the growing pro-choice majority in the population.

The realization of this goal, however, depends on the extent to which the march is a clear and independent affirmation of women's right to choose. If efforts to build the demonstration give support to various politicians, its size and effectiveness could(continued on page 7, in “N.O.W. calls mobilization for Spring 92”)