Washington (Washington Jewish Week) — Why is it that after 29 years, the pro-choice community still celebrates the anniversary of Roe v. Wade?
This year, as in the past, Jan. 22 was observed across the country with candlelight vigils, rallies, press conferences, marches, lobby days in state capitals, dinners, lunches and even interfaith services.
Wherever there are National Council of Jewish Women groups, our members participated on that day just as they have for almost three decades. Along with other like-minded groups and individuals, they saluted the 7-2 U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that a woman’s right to choose to have an abortion is constitutionally protected by our right to privacy. This year, however, what’s in the back of our minds is that this historic decision is in real danger.
The late Justice Harry Blackmun, author of the majority opinion in Roe, explained the decision’s importance directly when he referred to it as, “a step that had to be taken as we go down the road toward the full emancipation of women.”
Anyone who remembers the days before the 1973 ruling understands his words. Before Roe, two thirds of the states outlawed abortion except to save a woman’s life, and 17 percent of all deaths due to pregnancy and childbirth were the result of illegal abortions. Before Roe v. Wade, an unwanted, unexpected or unhealthy pregnancy could cost a woman her mental or physical health, her future fertility or her life. Before Roe, women were not free to make moral decisions about this most personal and important aspect of their lives.
This new freedom expanded religious freedom as well. Since this 1973 ruling, women have been free to make decisions about their pregnancies in keeping with the dictates of their faiths. No religion’s view on this issue prevails. Women who do not believe in abortion are not coerced into terminating their pregnancies under any circumstances. As Jewish women, we are free, if we choose, to follow Jewish law in regard to making this decision.
With state neutrality on this issue, women are free to decide based on their religious beliefs, conscience and in consultation with their loved ones, physicians and clergy. A majority of the Jewish community and Jewish communal organizations agree that this is how it should be.
Hollow right
In many communities, reproductive choice is a hollow right so encumbered by restrictions that women have little or no choices. Since the Roe decision, prohibitions on insurance coverage for abortion services, lack of professional training in abortion procedures and the daily threat of clinic violence have made abortion services less accessible to many women in this country.
Perhaps the greatest threat, however, rests in the uncertainty of the future composition of the federal bench, the appellate courts and the Supreme Court, which serves as the ultimate safeguard of this and other rights. The high vacancy rate on the federal courts, as well as the real prospect of several upcoming Supreme Court vacancies, pose the biggest challenge yet to Roe v. Wade.
That’s why NCJW members around the country marked this Roe anniversary by calling their U.S. senators. These are the men and women who must vote to confirm appointments to the federal courts after they are nominated by the White House. Through their calls, NCJW members urged senators to confirm only those nominees with a demonstrated commitment to Roe v. Wade, a decision that we view as a basic human right.
This call-in day was part of BenchMark: NCJW’s Campaign to Save Roe, which aims to educate and mobilize the pro-choice Jewish community. We hope that other Jewish organizations will join us in defense of Roe, and we feel certain that pro-choice women and men in our community will visit www.ncjw.org to sign up to be part of this campaign.
A quick scan of anti-choice web sites indicates that these groups have already joined the effort to support judicial nominees who will overturn Roe v. Wade.
They have rallied behind Judge Charles Pickering Sr., under consideration to fill a vacancy on the Fifth Circuit Court covering Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. Judge Pickering has shown his views on choice, voting as Mississippi state legislator to ban abortions and leading the effort to get a plank in the Republican Party platform (1976) in support of overturning Roe.
Those who support freedom of choice cannot afford to stand on the sidelines, watching silently as our federal judiciary is packed with judges hostile to women’s reproductive rights.
Today, we tell young people what life was like for women before Roe v. Wade. What will we tell future generations about what we did to save reproductive choice, to secure the rights of women to make moral choices and control their lives?
Jan Schneiderman is the National Council of Jewish Women’s national president.
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