Harvard Pro-Choice Forces Face Questions

In about two weeks, the National Organization for Women (NOW) will sponsor a mobilization in the nation's capital for abortion rights, but students at Harvard seem to have lent uneven support to the cause.

With at first 100 people, then 50, and finally as few as 30 lingering for a pro-choice speak-out at the Yard last Tuesday, ambivalence seemed to reflect developments in Pennsylvania and Florida, where state legislatures took opposite sides on new restrictions of abortion rights.

But as the battle over reproductive rights intensifies, students and national women's group leaders agree that divisions over tactics pervade the pro-choice movement and affect visible support at Harvard.

The question facing reproductive rights' activists is this: whether to stay at home and fight new restrictions in their own state legislative chambers or trek to Washington to sway a Supreme Court that hears three critical abortion rights cases this fall.

"This has to remain a national issue in addition to a state issue," said Toni Troop, a vice president for the Boston chapter of NOW. "From what we saw last April we don't want to be at the point where anti-abortion folks have divided up geographically."

"I think it's important to make a statement to Washington to let them know that it's not a state issue but a national issue," said Julia L. Shaffner '91, coordinator for Students for Choice, which sponsored Tuesday's rally.

Although there is no doubt that pro-choiceforces at the College have gained momentum sincethe spring, student activists said, debate overthe movement's direction still hinders the cause.

At an immediately local level, answers have attimes been clear. Undergraduates have picketedalleged fake abortion clinics, confrontedOperation Rescue members at pregnancy centers andrallied support for state amendments securingabortion rights.

Yet events like this week's rally raise doubtswhether pro-choice supporters still believe itworthwhile to repeat the Herculean efforts of lastApril, when more than 900 undergraduates traveledto Washington, D.C., for the first march.

Earlier this fall, pro-choice officialsapparently thought it would be, ordering more thanthe nine buses they rented in April. Now, however,they seem wary of declaring how much support theyhave.

Academic conflicts in the autumn, pessimismregarding the Supreme Court's views and the sensethat battle lines have shifted away fromWashington are occasionally voiced by ardentlypro-choice students.

Leaders from Students for Choice saidattendance at the speak-out did not reflectstudent commitment to the issue, but ratherundergraduates' busy schedules.

"There were less people there than at astandard pro-choice rally, but that doesn't meanthat support is waning--it's just that people havesomething else to do," said J. MatthewKittelberger '90, a planning committee member ofStudents for Choice.

And undergraduates said simple urgency willcompel supporters to turn out for the Mobilizationfor Women's Lives this November in as a large anumber--if not larger--than last April.

"At least for the people who are activelyinvolved with the pro-choice issue, [the Websterdecision] makes the problem all the more clear,"said Dulcy Anderson '92, a member of the Studentsfor Choice planning committee.

"When it's just one vote away from overturningRoe v. Wade you're just impelled to act. IfTurnsdale v. Ragsdale gets decided andclinics start closing, people will stop and thinkbecause no one will preserve out choice for usunless we do it."

But some undergraduates said they believe it ismore important to devote their money--andenergy--to working on the state level.

Margot B. Kushel '89-'90, an intern with Mass.Choice, said that since the July Missouri vs.Webster Reproductive Health Services decision,the abortion rights fight has switched away fromthe federal government.

"Regrettably the fight now is in the states,"Kushel said. "The state legislatures now have beentold that they can start chipping away at women'sabortion rights, and they may be furtherencouraged by cases being tried in the SupremeCourt this spring."

But Kushel said in any case that the movementis in a crisis that overrides all timeconcerns--including that of next month'sdemonstration.

Troop, however, said she did not think thatworking on state and national levelssimultaneously was unrealistic.

"The more visible we are, the more outraged weget, the more people there are who will come intothe movement," Troop said. "We have to have manyways to direct their energy. We would be sellingourselves short if we don't try to do more.