"The Pro-Life Path to Overturning Roe v. Wade"‏

From Jeanneane Maxon 
Vice President of External Affairs and Corporate Counsel 
Americans United for Life

I want to share with you an encouraging news story showing how your investment in life-saving laws is truly paying off.

The title of this week’s feature in the Deseret News is "No longer silent and incremental: the pro-life path to overturning Roe v. Wade."

Reporter Sara Israelsen-Hartley wrote:

"The anti-abortion movement has gradually shifted its tactics away from the aggressive in-your-face demonstrations to discreetly working the state political system, and observers, legal experts and even pro-abortion rights groups admit the strategy is working. Since 2000, state legislatures have passed 435 abortion restrictions nationwide (260 in the past five years alone), a continuous streak of small, strategic and often overlooked anti-abortion victories."

Talking about health and safety standards so popular with legislators, AUL’s Dr. Charmaine Yoest said:

"One of the things we're really focused on moving forward is clinic regulations …It's one of the things that upsets the other side the most, because they are profit driven, and the cheaper and shoddier they can provide their horrible product, the higher their profit margin. That's why they're so upset about clinic regulations."

Such laws have had the “biggest, immediate impact” in protecting lives, the reporter agreed. "Anti-abortion activists are quite strategic," says Joshua C. Wilson, a political science professor at the University of Denver."If they have trouble at the federal level, fertile ground is at the state level.”

And so it has been with your help. Consider this chart from the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute:

You made a difference in protecting lives across the country. In the article Yoest said:

“The anti-abortion campaign is wonderfully diverse … and the variety of approaches play an important role in the overall strategy. Some groups reach out to post-abortion women, others educate pregnant women and their partners about alternatives to abortion while others focus on getting anti-abortion legislators elected.

We (at AUL) deliberately set out to put a strategy together that addressed the fact that the courts were blocking any kind of major overarching strategy."

So what’s next? The abortion lobby is talking about it. Donna Barry, director of the Women’s Health and Rights Program at the Center for American Progress, said:

"It's possible (the anti-abortion activists) have more stuff up their sleeve we don't know about."

And so we do, but we can’t do it without you.

Thanks for supporting AUL’s work of saving lives through law. Next year is going to be even better!

Americans United for Life, the nation’s premier pro-life legal team, works through the law and legislative process to one end: Achieving comprehensive legal protection for human life from conception to natural death. The nonprofit, public-interest law and policy organization holds the unique distinction of being the first national pro-life organization in America— incorporated in 1971, before the infamous Roe v. Wade decision.  Use this link for more information on Americans United for Life.