1978 N.A.R.A.L. Ad    Appealing to people's stupidity and selfishness with lies

You may have forgotten how it was in the "good old days" before the Supreme Court legalized abortion. You may have become complacent about the liberty of choice you and your loved ones enjoy. But now your freedom to decide when to have a child is being threatened. Those who would take away that freedom are growing ever more vocal and ever more violent.

How was it before?

You may have forgotten that rich women used to fly to Sweden or Puerto Rico to have their abortions when abortion was illegal. You may have forgotten what happened to poorer women. They mutilated themselves with coat hangers and poisoned themselves to end the pregnancy. They put their bodies in the hands of ignorant and unfeeling people. They paid exorbitant fees to butchers who cared only about their money. They had their abortions under the most appalling conditions. They suffered, they bled and they died.

"Pro-Abortion" & "Pro-Life":
They couldn't be more wrongly named

We are not "pro-abortion." We are pro-choice and that's what we should be called. We simply support a woman's right to decide. If our dreams come true, there would never be an abortion again on this earth. Ideally, there would never be the need for abortion.

But we live in the real world. We live in a world where, in the United States alone, one million teenagers become pregnant each year, where half the brides under 18 are pregnant at marriage, where sex screams from the magazines, the ads, the newspapers, the billboards, the TV sets, the movies. Unwanted pregnancies are going to happen, and nothing will stop women from getting abortions. An estimated 1,000,000 a year received abortions before abortion was legalized.

Who are we? We are you. We are part of the overwhelming majority of Americans who are pro-choice today. We encourage nobody to have an abortion, and we certainly don't force anybody to have an abortion. We're delighted that 75% of Americans are happy with their pregnancies' and want to have children. (We want and love our own.) But we cannot see subjecting a person to mental anguish and physical suffering by compelling them to have a child.

They have one answer to everything:

whether you like it or not!"

"But I'm only 12 years old." "You must have that baby!"

"I have seven children already." "You must have that baby!"

"I was raped."

"You must have that baby!"

"We'll have to go on relief." "You must have that baby!" "My father will kill me."

"You must have that baby!"

"The doctor says it will die before it's two. "

"You must have that baby!"

"My IUD failed."

"You must have that baby!"

"I'm 50, 1 thought I couldn't get pregnant."

"You must have that baby!"

_There are dozens

Who are the so-called "pro-life" people? They are the COMPULSORY PREGNANCY people, and that's what they should be called: Whose life are they "pro?" Certainly not the life of the woman. Certainly not the life of a child born into poverty. Certainly not the life of a child certain to be born with severe defects. Do they show you women in the death throes of peritonitis? Do they show you the pain, the suicides, the wrecked lives? Do they show you the cost to the taxpayers for raising unwanted children to adulthood? Do they show you the neglected children who go wrong, who fill the jails and perpetuate poverty? Where is their responsibility after they compel a birth? Suddenly, "pro-life" doesn't sound so noble anymore.

Abortion is a personal decision. That's what we say, and most Americans agree. That the fertilized

egg and fetus are complete human beings is a religious belief not shared by most religions. The attempt to foist this viewpoint on Americans in the form of COMPULSORY PREGNANCY LEGISLATION goes counter to the separation of church and state guaranteed by the Constitution.

The same people who demand COMPULSORY PREGNANCY are often the very ones who oppose the dissemination of contraceptive information-the very thing that would do the most to prevent abortion.

Will you help?

Your legislators are under attack by the COMPULSORY PREGNANCY people. The poorest women are being denied State and Federal funding for abortion. And that's not all. Clinics, where clean, safe conditions are assured, have been bombed and set afire. Fanatics inflamed by COMPULSORY PREGNANCY propaganda are picketing and attacking abortion clinics and terrorizing women.

Help us. Join our organization, so that we can keep you informed. We will voice your concern to your legislators and support them against COMPULSORY PREGNANCY pressures. Help us defend the just and sensible decision of the Supreme Court that made abortion legal! '

You or your loved ones may never need an abortion, but can you be sure?

 

National Abortion Rights

compulsory pregnancy