N.O.W. calls mobilization for Spring 92

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'Gag' rule decision draws 7000 in NY protest Donna Binder /trapact Visuale we gag tie, one reponeu on we nuge congressionar vole wwice tookeu pronusing(continued from page 1: “Nat'l Organization for Women calls for giant mobilization in Spring 1992”)be severely limited.

The resolution, however, calls for the march "to make the 1992 elections become a national referendum on whether or not this nation will go backwards into a shameful era of racial and sexual oppression or forward into the 21st century.

Such language makes it clear that the leadership of NOW intends to use the march as a tactic to corral activists into the 1992 presidential election process-and not to build a mass, independent movement. The lack of clear demands focusing on abortion rights cuts across the potential to mobilize a million people in defense of abortion rights.

NOW member Joni Jacobs, the Socialist Action candidate for mayor of San Francisco, tried unsuccessfully to get the floor in order to amend the resolution to demand full reproductive freedom for all women. Her proposed amendment pointed out that "limitations on young or poor women's access to abortion are a direct attack on all women. We will not accept any compromises on this basic human right." Her amendment also would have deleted references tying the march into the 1992 While this attempt to amend the resolution failed, the NOW leadership may find that the process of building such a huge mobilization will have its own dynamic. Their intent may be to herd the movement into the Democratic Party, but the lessons learned by women and men organizing in their own interests could spark a fire for political independence that can't be easily contained.

Many delegates sported buttons declaring, "I'm ready for the party" to show their July 6 demonstration at Columbus Circle.

... Restrictions (continued from preceding page)

country. Its Rust v. Sullivan decision prohibits federally-funded family planning clinics from informing women that they have the legal right to abortion. If a woman asks about an abortion, the clinic staff must tell her: "This facility does not consider abortion an appropriate method of family planning and therefore does not counsel or refer for abortion."

The court has effectively destroyed the privacy of the doctor-patient relationship and denied the constitutionally-protected free speech rights of every federally-funded health provider in the country.

We cannot trust the politicians We cannot let this attack on liberty continue. Women must have the right to control our reproductive lives. If we cannot make these important, personal decisions free from govermental interference, we can never control our own lives.

Each year over 250,000 women die worldwide from botched, illegal abortions. We remember how many American women died before Roe v. Wade. We will not go back to those days. We will not go back into the back alleys and the closets. Patricia Ireland Marty Lederbandler-AP 'This conference marked a further entrenchment of the NOW leadership.' anger with how the Democrats and Republicans have trampled on women's rights and their support for a new political party. Of the 200 NOW members who crowded into a Saturday morning workshop on "a new party," only a handful opposed NOW initiating such a party.

A "new party" discussed Those speaking on the need to stop supporting Democratic and Republican party candidates were roundly applauded. Even most of those who favored NOW's supporting "feminist" Democrats and Republicans failed to raise their hands when asked if they were personally willing No longer can we rely on politicians or the courts to protect our rights. They are hopelessly out of step with majority opinion. While 80 percent of Americans remain pro-choice, state after state restricts our rights, and the courts uphold these laws. We must ask ourselves, whose interests do these institutions represent? Certainly they're not the interests of women.

We must join together, all of us-teenaged women, women of color, working women, lesbian women-to stand up to the misogynists in the Supreme Court, the state legislatures, and the police departments.

We must come together and build a movement to demand that every woman be allowed unrestricted access to safe, legal abortion. We must demand an extension of reproductive rights to include access to prenatal and postnatal programs, treatment and counseling for drug-dependent mothers, and childcare. When women have abortions because they cannot afford to raise children, their choices are just as limited as when abortion is outlawed.

Only when women and prochoice men unite in a powerful, independent movement will we achieve our demands. Only then will safe, legal, accessible abortion be a reality for every woman in every state of this country. Only then will women be unbound, ungagged, and truly free. to volunteer to work on such campaigns.

There is no clear agreement, however, that the kind of "new party" needed to change politics in this country is a labor party representing the interests of working people, women, African Americans, and other minorities.

Despite the growing anger of NOW members with the two ruling parties, this conference marked a further retreat into the Democratic Party on the part of the NOW leadership. Although the leadership's resolution on political action details many of the bipartisan attacks on women's rights, it fails to call for ending support to candidates of these twin capitalist parties. And an hour of the Saturday afteroon plenary session was spent raising Political Action Committee (PAC) funds for Democrats.

This conference also marked a further entrenchment of the NOW leadership. Terms of office were extended from three to four years. An all-out arm-twisting effort by the leadership succeeded in defeating a proposed by-law change that would have allowed candidates for national NOW office to run independent of slates.

Parliamentary maneuvers assured that only those resolutions which the leadership wanted debated reached the floor. Floor microphones were carefully manipulated to limit discussion on those issues that particularly concerned the leadership.

Protest against the FBI Depite these limitations, the mood of the rank-and-file members was expressed at times. When delegates learned that the FBI had been invited to set up a recruitment table in the exhibition area and had a fullpage ad in the conference program book, enraged NOW members started a petition campaign to bring a resolution to the floor demanding an explanation. An impromptu demonstration was organized against the XITKA ANA AL AXE York City against the "gag rule."

national conference of NOW.

women of their legal right to abortion.

ulations against abortion counseling.

On Saturday, June 29, Operation Rescue escalated their terrorist tactics against women's rights in San Francisco. They blockaded Dr. Madelyn Kahn's office, locking the doctor and her staff inside, and her patients out. Over 50 pro-choice clinic defenders went there to try and reopen the office so the doctor could attend to her patients. The doctor has a private obstetrics and gynecology practice and two of her patients were in labor at a nearby hospital.

DI. Kahn wrote to both daily S.F. newspapers saying, "I will never forget the fear that 1 expenenced that Saturday morning when my person, my property and my practice were threatened. The inaction by the police and their refusal to FBI presence.

Later, Patricia Ireland took the floor to apologize for the political error of having invited an outfit which has spied on and disrupted the work of many civil rights and socialist organizations. She gave as an example the FBI's 40-year campaign of harassment of the Socialist Workers Party.

The workshops provided an opportunity for feminists from around the country to engage in a rich discussion on such diverse topics as Operation Rescue, youth activitists in the 1990s, reproductive health issues, affirmative action quotas, and maquiladoras (the low-wage Mexican factories used by American companies to increase their profits).

Issue hearings which produced resolutions for consideration at the Sunday plenary session included economic rights, lesbian rights, global feminism, racial and ethnic diversity, violence against women, reproductive rights, feminization of power, feminization of poverty, and women's health.

Participation by young feminists was evident. The first national Young Feminist Conference in February passed resolutions on a full range of topics. These resolutions were brought before the national NOW conference for a vote. In general, these resolutions were more action-oriented than their counterparts from the national NOW conference. A Conference Implementation Committee was officially established, making the Young Feminists an ongoing part of NOW.

A global feminist conference, projected to attract some 2000 feminists from around the world, is planned for January 1992 in Washington, D.C. The next national NOW conference is scheduled for June 26-28, 1992, in Chicago, with a special emphasis on issues affecting women from racial minorities. remove the demonstrators... who were blocking the entrance was inexcusable.

The S.F. Police Department refused to arrest the offenders or make them leave. Finally, after the pro-choice defenders made it clear that they would start removing the blockaders themselves, the police warned Operation Rescue to leave or be arrested.

At that point, the blockaders filed out to the street and walked away from their crime-scot-free!

The doctor, women's rights activists in NOW, and other Bay Area medical and women's rights organizations are protesting the blatant refusal of the SFPD to uphold the law which prohibits the blockading of medical facilities that dispense reproductive services in California.

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around to satisfy restive groups of workers. in Jo