Migration Category: news-1-5000-national

Gore says his 10-year, $339 billion proposal to strengthen Medicare will benefit “every woman in the land.” The proposal, which notes that one-third of women on Medicare lack prescription drug coverage as well as having overall higher health costs, includes the addition of a prescription drug benefit that will ensure women affordable prescription medication. The plan also includes a $3,000 tax credit for the more than 9 million women caring for elderly, sick, or disabled relatives.

In San Diego, George W. Bush met privately with representatives of the Catholic Health Association of the United States to discuss healthcare reform. Governor Bush and the Catholic healthcare leaders discussed their mutual agreement on an anti-abortion platform and the potential of passing regulatory and legislative protection to ensure that Catholic health facilities, providers, and health plans are “free to act in a manner consistent with their religious beliefs.”

After working for more than a year to gain investigational status of mifepristone in Canada, Dr. Ellen Wiebe of Vancouver has finally been approved to begin Canada’s first clinical trial of mifepristone. The study will be conducted at four research centers in Vancouver, Toronto, Quebec City and Sherbrooke despite continued problems getting proper funding. Mifepristone has not yet received general approval for use in Canada but has been given “investigational status” for Dr. Wiebe’s study. The FDA is currently considering mifepristone for approval in the United States, with final action expected by September 30, 2000. Click here to find out more about possible restrictions on the use of mifepristone in the United States.

Citing the absence of clemency procedures and concerns about racial and geographic disparities in death penalty cases, President Clinton is planning to postpone what was to be the first federal execution in almost 40 years. The Justice Department is compiling a report that will try to determine if members of racial minorities or individuals in specific parts of the country are more likely to face the federal death penalty. Since 1988, the attorney general has authorized the death penalty against 199 defendants, more than three-fourths of which were members of minority groups. Between 1995 and 1998, there were 471 death penalty cases submitted to the Justice Department with just under half of those cases originating in five judicial districts. The study should be completed within a week to two.

Dr. LeRoy Carhart, the sole plaintiff in Stenberg vs. Carhart, the U.S. Supreme Court’s most recent 3-4 decision, is facing possible eviction by three abortion opponents who recently purchased his clinic building in Bellevue, Nebraska. The buyers purchased the property for $325,000 in spring of 2000 and used a clause in Carhart’s lease to request that he move out in six months. Although the three abortion opponents maintain that the building is a worthwhile real estate investment, they also acknowledge that their decision to purchase the property is in part based on their anti-abortion views and the clinic’s close proximity to St. Mary Catholic School. Two of the buyers belong to the St. Mary parish.

Landlord-tenant disputes remain a common method for abortion opponents to continue their campaign to put abortion providers out of business. A number of similar disputes have emerged around the country in recent years where abortion opponents have attempted to evict, or refused to renew leases for abortion clinics or referral agencies working out of their buildings. The problem has become enough of a concern that the National Abortion Federation publishes a handbook that advises abortion doctors on leasing office space for their clinics. Dr. Carhart has been fighting his attempted eviction in Sarpy County District Court.

A recent Los Angeles Times Poll reported that 68% of Americans favor laws to protect lesbians and gays from job discrimination and 66% reported their support of laws protecting against housing discrimination (LA Times Poll/Nation 6/8-6/13). The survey indicates a shift in public opinion that supports a more open acceptance and understanding of individual sexual preference. Seven years ago only 30% of Americans admitted to knowing an openly gay person compared with 70% presently. Although public opinion demonstrates a higher acceptance of gay rights there remains reluctance on the part of some institutions ranging from the Boy Scouts of Americans to churches. The Episcopalian Church has refused to officially state a policy to integrate lesbian and gay rights and the consecration of same-sex marriages. Many conservatives within the church have in the past “called homosexuality incompatible with Scripture.” This opinion is in strong contrast with poll results that show 50% of Americans favoring gay and lesbian marital rights equal to those of same-sex marriages (LA Times Poll/Nation 6/8-6/13).

Analysts predict that the growing concern of women, particularly those under the age of 50, over the crisis in the quality, affordability, and supply of early child-care in the U.S., will make the subject a serious campaign issue in the upcoming presidential election. According to the Washington Post 64% of mothers of preschoolers are employed and the Census Bureau ranks day care cost for young families as the biggest expense after housing and food. The U.S. has lagged behind most industrialized nations in investing in its early child care system, the issue often being held hostage to politics. President Nixon vetoed a bill in 1971 to assist working class families with child-care suggesting it would promote “communal approaches to child-rearing overƒthe family centered approach. President Clinton’s 1998 proposal to expand the child tax credit was blocked by Republicans, claiming that the move would discriminate against mothers who stay at home with their children.

A study by the National Stroke Association and the National Institutes of Health suggests that the contraceptive benefits of birth control pills, taken in low doses, outweigh the increased risk of stroke found in earlier studies. Sixteen previous studies showed that women taking the pill suffered from stroke twice as much as those who did not take the pill. The recent study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, highlights the pill’s benefits, and reports that the risk of stroke amounts to only one additional stroke annually per 24,000 women who take low-dosage birth control pills. The study also outlines the negative consequences of not taking birth control-namely the estimated 687,000 unintended pregnancies, and the risks associated with abortion, pregnancy, and unintended children.

Colorado voters could have the opportunity to vote on a ballot initiative that, if passed, would regulate gun sales at weekend gun shows. Currently, private dealers at gun shows are exempted from conducting the criminal background checks required for licensed dealers. The ballot initiative would allow voters to overturn the recent move by Colorado’s Republican-led State Legislature to block comprehensive gun control measures. Statewide polls suggest strong support for the measure, with over 80 percent favoring requiring background checks at gun shows. The “gun show loophole” has been the target of gun control advocates. The New York Times reported that one-quarter of gun show vendors are not licensed gun dealers. The issue is particularly salient in Colorado, because all four of the weapons used in the Columbine shootings were purchased at gun shows. Information on gun control is available from the Million Mom March at www.millionmommarch.com.

The Supreme Court last week rejected an appeal by male athletes from Illinois State University, which recently eliminated the men’s wrestling and soccer teams in an effort to balance opportunities for both men and women in the university’s sports system. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which was gutted by the Supreme Court in 1982 and restored by Congressional Act in 1986, is a major feminist victory that has banned gender discrimination in federally funded educational institutions. Under Title IX, women’s and girls’ opportunities in sports have increased enormously, but the amount of money directed to men’s and boys’ sports has also risen substantially. Women’s sports still receive less than 1/3 of the operating costs that men’s sports receive on the university level. The recruiting budget for women’s sports is only 30% of the recruiting budget for male sports, and a female coach receives only 34% of a male coach’s annual salary. (For more information on gender inequity in sports programs in colleges and universities, please see Welch Suggs, “Uneven Progress for Women’s Sports.” The Chronicle of Higher Education. April 7, 2000.)

The University of Illinois argued in the case that eliminating the men’s teams was a means to bring about gender equity in the institution’s sports programs. Since the passage of Title IX, feminists have held that the standard for compliance should always be to lift women’s sports to parity with men’s, and not to decrease men’s sports. Feminists have won every major Title IX case since 1986. Popular support for Title IX has also risen dramatically.

On July 6, 2000, forty-three young women representing forty-one college campuses nation-wide, gathered at the 4th annual Feminist Majority Leadership Institute in Arlington, Virginia to learn pro-choice organizing strategies. The intense and exciting four-day Institute involved twelve hours of workshops per day, covering topics ranging from How to Fight the Right-Wing Backlash to How to Build a Feminist Resume. The goal of the Institute is to teach young feminists valuable leadership and organizing skills that will enable them to launch Feminist Majority Leadership Alliances or to strengthen current FM Leadership Alliances on their college campuses. In addition to pro-choice organizing, students learn how to implement FMF’s Choices Campaign using the Study and Action Manual.

Students had the opportunity to immediately put study into action by organizing a pro-choice Get Out the Vote pledge drive and rally held Saturday, July 8 in front of the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Together with field representatives from the Feminist Majority Foundation, participants in the Leadership Institute marched with pro-choice signs and cheers, approached pedestrians on the street and on the National Mall to sign a pledge to vote pro-choice in the November elections, and caught the attention of passing cars with a street-side burma shave that urged “Protect Abortion Access! Vote!” The highly successful event gave students hands-on experience they will use to organize similar Get Out the Pro-Choice Vote pledge drives and rallies upon their return to campus within the next couple of months.

Participants had time over the four days to share ideas and network with fellow feminist students attending the conference and with the eight Field Representatives leading the Institute. At the end of the Institute, inspired by the words of Feminist Majority Foundation President Eleanor Smeal and armed with skills in leadership and organizing, participants left prepared to implement feminist activism upon returning to their college campuses and to strengthen the current wave of the feminist movement.

For more information on the next Feminist Majority Leadership Institute, the Choices Campaign, or how to organize a Get Out the Pro-Choice Vote pledge drive and rally on your campus, contact a member of the Campus Team at (703) 522-2214 or email us a Campusteam@feminist.org.

In a late-night session at 1:41 a.m., the U.S. House placed a domestic anti-abortion “gag-rule” amendment on the Quality Health-Care Coalition Act of 2000, which extends collective bargaining powers to doctors working under HMOs. The harsh and punitive amendment, introduced by Representative Tom Coburn (R-OK), would prevent doctors from discussing abortion or referring patients for abortion services. If this amendment were to become law, it would dramatically restrict women’s access to abortion.

“This vote,” says Feminist Majority Foundation President Eleanor Smeal, “shows the determination of the Republican-controlled House to eradicate women’s access to abortion at all costs, and indicates the importance of the power of the President to veto such anti-woman legislation.”

Coburn’s proposed amendment to the Agricultural Appropriations Bill, which would effectively prevent the FDA’s approval of mifepristone, was scheduled for the floor this week, but has been delayed until July 10, after the 4th of July holiday. Mifepristone, a drug that has been available outside the U.S. for 12 years, would provide women with a safe method of early non-surgical abortion.

On June 29th the U.S. succeeded in implementing one of its three pronged strategies to weaken the International Criminal Court (ICC), the first international court to include gender crimes as crimes against humanity. The U.S. has been pushing over the past two years a series of proposals that would provide a 100 percent exemption for U.S. military personnel and peacekeepers from the ICC’s jurisdiction even if they were suspected of sadistic crimes against women. On the next to final day of three weeks of high level meetings at the United Nations regarding the ICC, the U.S. won an agreement that excludes U.S. military personnel from facing charges taken before the ICC until the U.S. ratifies the treaty establishing the ICC. The treaty, known as the Rome Statute, was created in July 1998. The U.S. has refused to ratify the treaty. The ICC is set to become a working international treaty in the year 2002.

U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Jesse Helms (R-NC) will not allow the ICC to come to a Senate floor vote without a military exemption. For a treaty to be ratified, it must be approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and by a 2/3 vote of the Senate.

The Feminist Majority Foundation supports the establishment of the International Criminal Court as an important institute for ensuring human rights globally-especially the rights of women and girls.

The Feminist Majority Foundation is a member of the Washington Working Group and the Women’s Caucus for Gender Justice in a collaborative effort to ensure the establishment of the ICC.

With a razor-thin Supreme Court decision declaring abortion bans unconstitutional, women and feminists in the U.S. are letting politicians know that protecting access to abortion rights will be a major issue in the upcoming elections. Pro-choice, anti-abortion, and candidate reactions have varied widely, but all agree that the 5-4 vote reveals the fragility of abortion rights.

Anti-abortion groups vow to introduce new abortion procedure bans that would attempt to avoid the vague language that the Court struck down this week in the Nebraska case, Stenberg v. Carhart. But various sources, including the National Right to Life Committee, anticipate that anti-abortion attempts will fail again, as these bans do not include an exception for a woman’s health.

The Court’s swing vote, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, said such bans must include an exemption for women’s health. The Supreme Court decision has highlighted the importance of the upcoming presidential election, even as Republican candidate George W. Bush attempts to downplay his anti-abortion stance. In their reactions to Carhart, both Democratic candidate Al Gore and Tipper Gore stressed the next president’s power to nominate 3-4 Justices to the Supreme Court.

FDA Debates Over-the-Counter Birth Control Pills This week the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is debating the permissibility of some current prescription drugs including birth control pills being made available for over the counter purchase. An FDA decision granting over the counter sales of birth control pills at local pharmacies in grocery stores or drug stores would increase dramatically. Over the counter drugs are relatively inexpensive versus the costs of prescription only drugs. Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, remarks that, “Birth control pills can cost as much as $600 per year if you include the required yearly or semi-annual visits to the doctor. An FDA move to allow birth control pills to be sold over the counter will dramatically decrease the out of pocket expenses women incur in buying contraceptives.” In addition to contraception, the birth control pill has multiple positive implications for women’s health including reducing the risk of ovarian and endometrian cancer. Medical researchers have also shown that taking two birth control pills, with one pill taken 72 hours after sexual intercourse and the other pill taken 12 hours after the first serves as an emergency method of contraception.

Abortion Issue Catapulted To Higher Profile In The Presidential Campaign

The razor thin (5-4) Supreme Court decision in Carhart vs. Stenberg on June 28th striking down a dangerous anti-abortion ban passed by Nebraska legislators and 31 other states, pushed the abortion issue to the center of the presidential election. Democratic Presidential Candidate, Al Gore, who is pro-choice, stated yesterday that:

“The next president will nominate at least three, probably four, perhaps four justices to the Supreme Court. One extra vote on the wrong side of those two issues would change the outcome and a woman’s right to choose would be taken away.” Women’s rights activists expressed grave concern over the 2000 Presidential Election outcome in making Supreme Court and Federal Judge appointments. According to a June 18th Los Angeles Times Poll, nearly two-thirds of Americans “say they have no clear sense of either candidate’s position on the issue at this point in the presidential races.”

Press accounts indicate that Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush, who is anti-abortion, seems to be following an early campaign decision of trying to keep abortion out of the presidential debate. Yet many anti-abortion leaders have urged Bush to speak out on the importance of future appointments to the Supreme Court for abortion. Phyllis Schafly of the Eagle Forum commented that she would like “him (Bush) to aggressively criticize the (Supreme Court) decision and to say how important it is that we have judges who respect innocent human life.” Others say that abortion presents a grave threat to the National Republican Party’s strategy to win the White House and other elections, with 68% of Americans, including possible swing and independent voters, favoring keeping the decision about abortion between a woman and her doctor (6/18/00 Los Angeles Times Poll).

[Source: New York Times – 28 June 2000]

The Coburn Amendment to the Agricultural Appropriations Bill, which would limit the FDA’s ability to continue research on mifepristone (formerly known as RU486), is expected to be introduced this week. Mifepristone is an early abortion pill that has been available to women outside of the U.S. for 12 years. In addition to its uses in terminating a pregnancy at a very early stage extremely safely, mifepristone is also a possible treatment for diseases and conditions that particularly effect women such as brain tumors (meningioma), ovarian cancer and fibroid tumors.

Click Here to Tell Your Representatives Not to Let Anti-Abortion Politics Interfere with Scientific Research, the FDA, and Women’s Healthcare.

The Commission to Combat Police Corruption, created by Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, in a draft report released on June 28th cited inexperienced prosecutors and lengthy delays as serious obstacles in the NYPD’s internal system for handling police misconduct including accusations of the use of excessive force and failure to respond, as in the recent Central Park assaults on women. Following the eight-month study the Commission recommends that the city set up an independent agency. “Time and again, police agencies have proved they lack the will to aggressively prosecute police corruption and misconduct, especially police brutality incidents and cases involving domestic violence by police officers,” said Chief Penny E. Harrington, director of the Feminist Majority Foundation’s National Center for Women & Policing. “For example, we know that national studies document that as many as 40% of police officers commit domestic violence, and yet only a handful are ever prosecuted or fired. That’s why outside civilian oversight of law enforcement is vital.”

The Feminist Majority Foundation’s National Center for Women and Policing works to increase the number of women and minorities in law enforcement agencies and improve police response to violence against women. For more information, please visit https://feminist.org/police/ncwp.html. Source: New York Times June 29 2000

By a 6 to 3 vote, the Supreme Court today upheld the constitutionality of legistlative buffer safety zones around abortion clinics in Hill v. Colorado. The Court held that buffer zones created through state legislation can be enacted to protect clinics and women seeking health care services. The decision tracked the Court’s 1994 Madsen ruling on buffer zones created through court-ordered injunctions, though by a narrower margin.

“This eight foot buffer zone protecting doctors, patients, and health-care workers entering and exiting a clinic is absolutely essential. Violence is still occurring at 20 percent of our nation’s clinics,” said Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation. “Buffer zones do not limit free speech – but help to curb violence. We hope more states will take Colorado’s lead in protecting women’s health clinics instead of waiting first for violence to occur. Pity that even on this, there are three negative votes on the Supreme Court and that we have lost one vote since the Madsen case was handed down in 1994,” concluded Smeal.

The Feminist Majority Foundation conducts the nation’s oldest and largest Clinic Access Project. Nearly one third of the nation’s clinics are protected by buffer safety zones. The Feminist Majority Foundation provided legal counsel for the abortion clinic in the 1994 Madsen Supreme Court case.

Gay rights activists received a blow today when the Supreme Court ruled that because the Boy Scouts oppose homosexual conduct, they are not required to accept gay scoutmasters in their organization. In 1990 when the Scouts found out that Assistant Scoutmaster James Dale was gay, they ousted him from his position claiming that homosexual conduct is “inconsistent with the values it seeks to instill.” A New Jersey state court ruled that the Boy Scouts’ action violated a law banning discrimination in public accommodation but the 5-4 Supreme Court decision said that forcing the Boy Scouts to accept gay troop leaders would violate the organization’s rights of free expression and free association.

Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, was appalled by the ruling. “This tragic decision of the Supreme Court will not stand the test of time because, if history tells us anything, those who stand in the doorway using bigotry to bar entry for one generation will have to apologize to the next,” exclaimed Smeal.