A bill that would potentially restrict women's access to a full range of medical options made its way through the House and Senate, all the way to Gov. Doyle's desk, with barely a whisper from anyone. The \conscience clause"" vetoed by Doyle on Thursday was last mentioned by the local media in October. It's disturbing that a piece of legislation with such potentially far-reaching consequences was ignored during most of its passage.
This bill wasn't only concerned with abortion-Wisconsin doctors have been allowed to not provide them since the 1970s, when Roe v. Wade was decided. This bill expanded their opt-out possibilities substantially beyond abortion and sterilization to include procedures like in vitro fertilization. Also included were sections on euthanasia (already illegal) and the right to refuse to remove a feeding tube, against the wishes of a patient's family. Pharmacists could have refused to provide medicine they believed would be used for abortion or euthanasia. While they could not refuse to provide contraceptives, what would or could they do with borderline cases, such as if a female patient came in with a prescription for only one pill pack of oral contraceptives, long known as an alternative to the morning after pill?
Most disturbingly, however, and the true heart of the problem with this bill, is that physicians could refuse to refer their patients to other doctors who did provide the treatment, or even not tell them the treatment was available if it would go against their moral or religious beliefs. They could simply not tell them... thereby giving themselves precedence over their patients' needs. What does it matter that RU-486 is now legal if the only doctor in an area won't prescribe it, or the pharmacist won't sell it? What good does its technical legality do if it is not available to those who need it, or if they don't even know it exists?
Sunday's March for Women's Lives in Washington D.C. was a grand show against the false contentment that let the conscience clause through. Unofficial estimates place the crowd at 500,000 to 800,000 people (organizers claim over a million), all marching not only for abortion rights but for women's right to control their lives. With supporters coming from all over the United States as well as some 60 other nations, the protest was even larger than one held in 1992 at the tail end of the first Bush administration, when the debate over the right to choose was even more violent and confrontational.
While bills at the state level, like the conscience clause, and laws at the national level, like the Unborn Victim's Act and the ban on Dilation and Extraction (known by opponents as partial birth abortion), are small steps in the goals of anti-abortion activists, they are the current line of attack, and one that's working surprisingly well. Their current dominance in American politics is now stretching past the U.S. border to affect the rest of the world. Bush's global gag rule, one of his first acts upon gaining office, denies U.S. funding to family planning and health clinics abroad which even mention abortion as an option, let alone offer them. The conservative agenda is now changing the lives of both women here and women all over the world.
For all the talk of the liberal media, for all the insistence that liberals need to be vocally opposed to things working against their agendas, the left is still not doing enough. Women's ability to control their own bodies is slowly being taken away, piece by piece and bit by bit. There has not been a united fight to rally around, as when choice opponents were pushing for a constitutional amendment. But just as liberals campaign for ""anybody but Bush,"" the fight is returning to the streets. The women and men marching in D.C. recognize the danger, the damage Bush and a conservative congress have already done, and the devastation of a possible second term. There is heavy speculation that whoever is elected in November will be appointing two new Supreme Court justices and affecting the future pace of social change. Another four years of Bush could mean a hard swing right for the next few decades. It's just one more reason to work against his reelection this November.
But just as important will be the fights at the state level, where bills like the conscience clause will glide through in a suitable environment. The organization that brought hundreds of thousands to D.C. this weekend must mobilize with the same kind of force in each state. Pro choice activists, both men and women, need to make these smaller fights just as important as any other, for they're the new face of the neo cons movement, and they're more dangerous than ever before.
opinion@dailycardinal.com.
