A Harbinger of Things to Come
By Dave Andrusko

It is to PBS' Frontline's credit that it aired "The Last Abortion Clinic" just three weeks before the Supreme Court heard its first abortion case in five years. The audience impact of that kind of currency no amount of money could buy.

Thus it was almost inescapable that I would think of the program (written, produced, and directed by Raney Aronson-Rath) as I listened to the discussion between the justices and New Hampshire Attorney General Mary Ayotte, Planned Parenthood attorney Jennifer Dalven, and U. S. Solicitor General Paul Clement.

The thrust of "The Last Abortion Clinic" is summarized by an unnamed abortion clinic owner who bemoans the turn of events.

"Sometimes I fantasize about Roe being overturned because then I think that there would be this real threat, this real enemy," she says. "As long as everything flies below the radar, never an all-out attack, I think that most women and men are asleep. I don't think they realize what's going on."

She adds ominously, "The assault on abortion rights is very clever. It's very smart, and we are losing."

This is the combination of truth, paranoia, and complete misunderstanding of the people of our Movement and the majority of Americans that simultaneously serves to depress and cheer up our benighted opposition. After all, if the only reason cases such as the one the High Court heard make their way through the many chokepoints in the legislative and judicial systems is because "most women and men are asleep," then, hallelujah, all they need do is rouse the Sleeping Pro-choice Giant.

In other words, dastardly pro-lifers are wielding their power because they have snookered the public. They and their "real" agenda are hidden in plain sight, so to speak.

"The Last Abortion Clinic" refers to the last abortion clinic operating in Mississippi, the Jackson Women's Health Organization. It is to serve as a kind of dramatic point of emphasis: if the silent (or, in the case, the sleeping) majority doesn't rouse itself from its slumber, someday there won't be any clinics, not just in Mississippi, but everywhere.

The PBS program, on the whole, was as balanced as you hope to see. But there are three unfortunate table-setting assumptions which color the way viewers will see pro-lifers. All are either wrong or partial (and therefore misleading) truths.

We didn't sudden discover women, once the High Court slapped down our attempt to overturn Roe but did give us more room to maneuver. The movement could never have soared without a strong Problem Pregnancy Wing.

Pro-lifers have always cared about both mother and child. An interesting side note, which the program misses altogether, is that the Movement is gradually increasing its outreach to the fathers of aborted children.

I have talked with these men. They hurt to the very depths of their souls. For the life of me I cannot determine whether they are more broken if they actively foisted abortion on the women in their lives; tried to stop the abortion and failed; or were indifferent. In all three instances, the pain is excruciating and acknowledged by virtually no one except other fathers who have lost children to the Moloch of abortion.

Second, there are plenty of people of faith in our Movement. Probably a strong majority are believers. But (a) there are tons of men and women who have no religious inkling or affiliation, and (b) even when one is motivated by a faith commitment that does not mean the case for life cannot be discussed in a language accessible to the wider public.

The third and most irritating intimation is about the place of violence in our Movement. If you believe the narrator's account, success has bred a "dramatic change in that movement's strategy." The hint is that pro-lifers were once soft on the firebombing of clinics and worse, but now a taste of victory has calmed us down. Now, we are told, there are only a "few extremists" who "still pursue these tactics."

Note to Frontline. 99.9% of the Movement has vigorously opposed any illegal, let alone violent activity, and have in season and out, in good times and bad. To suggest otherwise is an ugly smear.

This issue of "the pro-life newspaper of record" is filled with coverage of the Ayotte oral hearings. Please read the stories on pages one and 15 for background to the case and a sense of what happened in the courtroom.

If you haven't ordered tons of extra copies of the special January 22 NRL News Commemorative Issue, please use the form on page 19, or go to www.nrlc.org and download the order form. I'm pleased that orders are already streaming in. But I want to see copies of this special edition in the hands of every pro-lifer.

Thanks for all that you are doing. It is symbolic and encouraging, to put it mildly, that the case the High Court heard came from a state which, historically, has been bitterly inhospitable to pro-life legislation.

If pro-life legislation can pass in the Northeast, it can pass anywhere.