Keep on Marching

May 21, 2004

So, you probably thought we deserved a break, right? You probably thought that maybe, after organizing the largest march in U.S. history, after coming from near and far to pack the National Mall with feminists of all ages, sizes, colors, genders, sexual orientations, and political parties, after bringing more than one million people together to protest extremist anti-woman policies from Congress, the states and the Bush administration, then maybe, just maybe, we could take a breather.

Think again.

NOW President Kim Gandy joined Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) and Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) at a May 12 news conference criticizing the FDA's decision to block easier access to emergency contraception. Photo by Lisa Bennett

Only two weeks after the phenomenal March for Women's Lives right in their own backyard, the Bush administration struck again, with their determined efforts to make abortion and contraception less available. On May 6, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) officials (translation: Bush appointees) overruled their own professional staff and expert panels to block easier access to the morning-after pill, also called emergency contraception, which can prevent pregnancy if taken within 72 hours.

Women deserve to trust that the FDA will follow medicine, not politics, in making decisions about our health. If the FDA and the Bush administration do not set this right, and fast, the voters must make it right in November.

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         No C-heney
         No A-shcroft
         No R-umsfeld
         No B-ush
         (And certainly no Rice!)

Let's show them who's boss. Join NOW's user-friendly voter registration and voter education program, 10 for Change. It's easy: sign up, we'll show you how to register people you know, and we even give out some prizes along the way. You sign up new voters, they sign up new voters, we all sign up new voters, and we get regime change in November.

This week also marks the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, a bittersweet milestone in the ongoing battle for civil rights for all. Yes, we've come a long way, baby, but not nearly as far as some think. Here we are, 50 years later, and segregation not only still exists, it is on the rise in many places. This may not be the "massive resistance" of 1954, but the challenges to full racial equality are more insidious now. It's not Gov. George Wallace standing in the door of the University of Alabama, and it's not Bull Connor turning fire hoses and police dogs on peaceful civil rights demonstrators. Yes, it matters that the state no longer sanctions racial segregation. No, it does not mean we have won.

Among the problems we continue to face is unexpressed but deeply rooted resistance, cloaked by socioeconomic factors that allow for constant misinterpretation and misrepresentation. But the facts speak for themselves: At schools across the country (and right here in D.C.), you could watch students getting off the buses in the morning and never know that the Court ordered desegregation 50 years ago. This doesn't mean nothing happened: previously all-white schools have become almost all black, and vice versa, proving that change is not necessarily progress.

But let's end on a high note, shall we? There may be no rest for the weary, but at least there are some victories along the way. Despite last-ditch efforts by Republican Gov. Mitt Romney and Republican legislators, on Monday Massachusetts became the first state to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples. The pictures in the papers said it all: tears in the eyes of longtime partners who could finally wed, joy in the faces of those lined up waiting outside city halls, and love from the families who had come to witness the ceremonies.

After seeing this, who could argue that same-sex unions threaten the institution of marriage? The Virginia legislature, apparently, which wasted no time in passing a bill forbidding persons of the same sex from entering into any contract that "provides any of the privileges or obligations" of marriage. Such a law is unconstitutional, of course, and the ACLU has vowed to file suit, but that didn't stop the small-minded defenders of morality from passing legislations anyway. It reminds me of a Louisiana legislator who said more than 20 years ago (when asked why he bothered to promote a bill that was clearly unconstitutional): "We can pass unconstitutional legislation faster than they can get it overturned."

And so it goes—a few steps forward, a few steps back, in a dance where each partner is trying to lead. I tell you, my feet are starting to get a little sore with all this dancing and marching. But it's a fight I wouldn't give up for the world.

Thank you for supporting NOW's work and standing with us!