NRLC's Grassroots Emphasis Is Winning the Day
Organizational Development, Outreach Departments Offer Key
Resources to Strengthening Movement at Local Level
By Dave Andrusko
Although we don't think about it often, all public policy organizations, including NRLC, blend efforts to communicate to larger numbers of people with more focused, one-on-one initiatives. The particular recipe adopted depends on an organization's resources - - financial and otherwise - - and what experience has proven gives it the most return for its "investment."
However, among public policy organizations, our Movement is, if not unique, very close to it. For three decades, the overwhelming majority of our endeavors have minimized our weakness - - unlike the pro-abortionists, we don't have money by the buckets full - - and played to our strength: a grassroots army of hundreds of thousands of people who care passionately about defending the defenseless and who are willing to put their convictions on the line, year in and year out.
The lesson to be learned from what amounts to a modern day David versus Goliath? Pro-abortionists have scads of money and the support of most of the major institutions in our culture. But we have people just like you.
Given this "people power," the Movement's emphasis on local, grassroots efforts, which steadily win new champions through good times and bad, continues to best advance the cause of unborn babies. That was true in 1973. It remains true today.
But before we talk about the pivotal work that takes place in local communities, there is the critically important work that must be done in our nation's capital. As the largest, most representative pro-life organization in the world, NRLC operates at both levels.
At the national level, NRLC is recognized by friend and foe alike as the preeminent pro-life force. NRLC lobbies, helping to pass pro-life legislation such as the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, while NRL PAC carefully marshals contributions to maximize the electoral prospects of pro-life candidates. This is in addition to providing reams of information that comes from the Education Department and is found in the pages of National Right to Life News, along with a dozen other activities.
But local chapters and state offices are the real bulwarks of our Movement. All NRLC departments lend a helping hand, but there are two which specialize.
They are the State Organizational Development Department, headed by Jacki Ragan, and the Outreach Department, led by Ernest Ohlhoff. They and their staffs make the difference by quickly providing expertise developed over a period of almost 30 years. (See pages 27-29.)
Both keep up to date on what is working best out in the "real world." But it is equally true that there are a number of basics - - from filing papers of incorporation to fundraising to working with churches to getting speakers into schools - - which have been tweaked in the nearly 30 years since NRLC was incorporated but which remain essentially unchanged.
But what is really new, in both a literal and figurative sense, is the infusion of young people. On page 29 you'll read about the explosion in the number of college pro-life organizations made possible by a willingness of students to stand up against peer pressure.
That "newness/youthfulness," however, is not confined to campuses. What has struck Ohlhoff is the number of inquiries coming from young families, especially mothers.
There is no shortage of work at every level for every pro-lifer. NRLC stands ready to help at a moment's notice.
As Ragan has said many times, "there is no need to reinvent the wheel." When people try to, they oft times wind up spinning their own wheels.
Your time is more productively spent when you turn to the experts: NRLC and your local and state NRLC affiliates.