January 2002

Grassroots Organizing:

Now More Than Ever

By Dave Andrusko

Most of our nearly 400,000 subscribers will receive this special NRL News edition around the time of the 29th anniversary of the infamous Roe v. Wade decision. That will be a somber occasion, for Roe "bruised the soul of America," as Jean Garton once observed, initiating a spiral of unhappiness, cruelty, and brutality that persists to this day.
On January 22, 1973, the powers that be welcomed the Supreme Court's cavalier treatment of history, haphazard explication of the law, and ludicrous leaps in logic with open arms. Recent developments in the states had shown that a pro-life counteroffensive was picking up steam and, rattled, pro- abortionists began to panic.

 

The ever-growing number of young people in the Movement means a whole new generation of leaders being groomed at the grassroots.

Euthanasia Apologists Mount Campaign to Whitewash Oregon Law

By Burke J. Balch, J.D., Director
NRLC Department of Medical Ethics

 

Attorney General John Ashcroft and President George W. Bush

A New Year's Day article appearing in the Washington Post provides an insightful glance into the themes pro-death forces are using to deflect mounting criticism of Oregon's unique-in-the-nation law that legalizes lethal prescriptions to assist suicide.
The nearly three-page long article praising Oregon's law, written by the Post's Susan Okie, is set against the backdrop of a fierce legal battle being fought in the courts. In a November 6 letter sent to the Drug Enforcement Agency, Attorney General John Ashcroft effectively reversed a 1998 decision by then-Attorney General Janet Reno that prohibited the DEA from enforcing federal drug control laws against doctors who prescribed lethal dosages under cover of Oregon's assisted suicide law.

• How We Will Win
  
• Urgent Congressional Alert:
  U.S. Senate to Debate Human Cloning Ban in
  February or March
  
• The Basic Elements of a Successful Chapter
  
• BE A FRIEND FOR LIFE
  
• Chapter Profile: The Epitome of a New Chapter
  This New Chapter is Up and Running
  
• Everything Starts There
  YOU, TOO, CAN FIND PRO-LIFERS
  
• Years of Visibility and Hard Work Continue To Benefit Unborn Children and Their Mothers
  
• What Is a Chapter? What Does a Chapter Do?
  Pro-Life Grassroots Activism Is Both Fun And Makes a Difference
  
• First Step: State Organizational Development Department
  NRLC Works Closely with Local RTLers, Offering Expertise, Resources, and Encouragement
  
• Abortion and the Pulpit
  Why Pastors Avoid the Abortion Issue And What to Do About That
  
• A Pro-Life Educational Primer
  Adaptation Keeps Educational Outreach on Cutting Edge
  
• Keeping the "Fun" in Chapter Fundraising
  
• Pro-Lifers Embrace Information Age
  
• Cultivating Relationships: The Key to a Successful Media Presence
  
• French Court Extends "Wrongful Birth" Ruling to Down Syndrome
  
• Your RTL Newspaper: It's Amazing What It Can Do
  
• Off-year Elections Very Important
  2002: CONTINUING TO BUILD ON SUCCESS
  
• Giving Talks in Schools
  Captivating a Captive Audience
  
• One Chapter's Experience
  
• Quiet Service and a Life of Difference
  
• Reflections of a College Kid
  Meetings, Mentoring, and Grooming the Next Generation of Pro- life Leaders
  
• Support National Right To Life, Increase Your Income, And Reduce Your Taxes
  

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From the President

PRO-LIFE WORKERS IN THE VINEYARD

As they have been so often in the 28 years since Roe v. Wade, abortion rights supporters are once again on the defensive. Says Lynn Paltrow, executive director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women [a project of the pro-abortion Women's Law Center], "There's no radical left anymore screaming, 'Free abortions on demand!'" The anti-abortion right scored its first public-opinion grab in 1995, with the bold war over so-called " partial-birth abortion."

Sharon Lerner ("A New Kind of Abortion War"), The Village Voice (12/26/2001)

[CGE] received support from more than 600 individuals, 12 major corporations and 29 foundations.

From a fundraising brochure of the Center for Gender Equality, headed by Faye Wattleton, ex-president of Planned Parenthood

[Presidential advisor] Karl Rove says Bush lost popular majority in 2000 presidential race because as many as 4 million conservative Christians didn't vote.

Item in "For the Record," National Review (12/31/2001)

The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with them for the usual daily wage, he sent them into the vineyard. Going out about nine o'clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and said to them, "You too go into my vineyard, and I will give you what is just." So they went off. He went out again around noon, and around three o'clock, and did likewise. Going out about five o'clock, he found others standing around, and said to them, "Why do you stand here idle all day?" They answered, "Because no one has hired us." He said to them, "You too go into my vineyard."

Mt 20: 1-7

It is now 29 years since an arrogant and overreaching Supreme Court handed the pro-abortionists a victory with Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton--an unearned victory, through the constitutional back door, so to speak. This, of course, was more than ill- intentioned judicial referees throwing a legal game: It was a frontal assault on life itself.
From the point of view of the pro-abortionists, the only thing missing in 1973 was the "mainstreaming" of abortion on demand as part of routine, mandated health care. It wasn't until the Clinton presidency that pro-abortionists thought they were going to succeed on that point with Hillary Clinton's infamous health care plan. The attempt to "mainstream" abortion on demand ("no questions asked," as columnist David Gergen put it) and ration lifesaving health care gave pro-lifers a strong reason to help defeat the plan.