WSJ: In Abortion Fight, Little-Known Group Has Guiding Hand

[question everything]

In Abortion Fight, Little-Known Group Has Guiding Hand

Americans United Chips Away In Legislatures, Courts; Coaching New Hampshire
Inspired by NAACP Playbook
By JEANNE CUMMINGS
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
November 30, 2005; Page A1

(snip)

But behind the scenes is a little-known Chicago-based organization called Americans United for Life, which for some 30 years has been guiding the effort to chip away at Roe v. Wade. A self-described "nonprofit, public-interest bioethics law firm," Americans United crafted the language used as a model for the 2003 New Hampshire law. Clarke Forsythe, a top lawyer with the group, earlier this month flew to Concord to help Ms. Ayotte practice the arguments she'll make before the justices.

(snip)

The New Hampshire case is just the latest step in Americans United's strategy to ultimately persuade the Supreme Court to overturn Roe, the landmark 1973 ruling establishing a woman's constitutional right to an abortion. It's a plan first outlined by the group in a 1987 book, titled "Abortion and the Constitution: Reversing Roe v. Wade Through the Courts," that still serves as a legal blueprint for the antiabortion movement. The group takes its inspiration from another long, gradual and ultimately successful effort to bring a fundamental change to American society through the courts: the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's drive to overturn the Supreme Court's "separate but equal" doctrine that underpinned segregation.

(snip)

As of 2004, more than 30 states had passed parental-notification laws similar to New Hampshire's, modeled on boilerplate language from Americans United. More than 20 states have enacted separate "informed consent" laws advocated by Americans United that require doctors to tell patients of health risks from abortion. Americans United also backed passage of a Virginia ban on a late-term abortion procedure. A challenge to that law and another involving a similar 2003 federal law, could be on the Supreme Court docket as early as next year.

(snip)

But a major factor shaping the questions that reach the court will be Americans United's strategy in navigating cases through the system to that level. "You don't get a case to the Supreme Court by putting it in a brown paper wrapper and putting it on the Supreme Court steps," says Mr. Forsythe. Now 47, he joined Americans United fresh out of law school and has been helping steer the anti-Roe cases through the legal system for the past 20 years. He's been Americans United's executive director, president and is now heading a new bioethics legal project.

(snip)

Write to Jeanne Cummings at [email protected]

URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113331435902109731.html (subscription)

[Gloria]

1. Where were our Democratic leaders all this time??

Apparently oblivious...hell, they just realized that Rethugs dominated the TV and radio airwaves...

[Erika]

2. The democrats let women down on their reproductive rights

and you better say goodbye to support of the party. I won't donate a cent.

[Warpy]

3. Not one cent, not one vote, not one solitary word of support

for any of them if they vote to confirm this bastard.

If they think they're out of power because the DLC sold the working class out, wait until they see what happens when they sell women out.

One of the things that swept Reagan into his first term was a backlash against Carter for his refusal to fund abortions for welfare recipients. A whole lot of abortion rights advocates voted for John Anderson in protest.

There weren't enough of us to swing the election had Carter not been a prick about our rights, but the difference gave Reagan what he thought was a clear mandate to nap while his cronies stole us blind.

The lesson to the DLC should be that the more people they sell out, the fewer they'll have in office. Given their recent penchant for running antiabortionists in races a real Democrat could have won, I'm beginning to think keeping the Dems out of power has been their plan all along.

[suigeneris]

4. How did that work out for you?

Assuming it's true that Carter lost in part over the abortion issue, was it better to fail to support him when the clear result was to elect a conservative Republican?

The answer is a resounding no! Think about those eight years of Reagan. We'll never undo the damage.

We need to find other ways than these self-destructive cut-off-our-noses-to-spite-our-faces actions when we are let down by leadership, to put pressure on them.

Not supporting the party elects the other guy. This is politics and like chess, you have to look ahead a few moves or you LOSE.

[Erika]

6. I'm with you 100%

They sell out women's rights, they don't have my vote.

[question everything]

5. The most offensive fact to me is that they modeled

their strategy after the NAACP attack on "separate but equal" doctrine. The NAACP fought to expand individual rights, while the anti privacy groups are fighting to limit them.

[enough]

7. kick