On the 25th Anniversary of Roe v Wade

Today, January 22, 1998,  we celebrate 25 years of freedom of choice -- 25 years of Roe v Wade. The reason we celebrate is that legal abortion saves women's lives. Before legalization, women still chose to end pregnancies, but thousands of women died from unsafe abortions. We celebrate today because for the past 25 years women have gotten safe abortions and, as a result, women have been able to take charge of their reproductive lives.

Abortion and birth control are powerful tools in the hands of women. They allow women to control their own destinies by determining for themselves when they will begin a family, or by spacing their children, or by choosing to be child-free. Women understand that having a baby -- or having another child -- will dramatically affect the rest of their lives. In our clinics, women explain their decision by saying "I just cannot have a baby right now."

When abortion was illegal, women risked their lives, their health and their safety to get an abortion. We celebrate today because women don't have to risk their lives and health. Legal abortion has made an enormous positive impact on women, on families and on communities.

Today, even though abortion is a safe medical procedure, the right to choose abortion is not secure. The attacks on a woman's right to choose come from all sides, from protesters who violently assault clinics and physicians, from legislators who feel compelled to limit some women's choices, from insurance companies and health care plans that don't cover abortion or birth control, from hospitals and clinics not providing the service, from lack of medical school training for new physicians, from the anti choice movement whose lies and distortions greatly mislead the public, from those who stigmatize women who chose abortion, from those who don't trust women's ability to make their own decisions in life.

And so, today, we rededicate ourselves to freedom of choice and recommit ourselves to activism to protect this important freedom. We remember the women who died before legalization. We appreciate the thousands of individuals and organizations who worked to win the right to choose and have subsequently worked to maintain it. Today, nearly 43% of American women have utilized the right to choose. We call upon the women who had the freedom of choice in the past to help us work to maintain it for future generations. We won't go back

"Abortion and birth control are powerful tools in the hands of women."

Feminist Women's Health Center