feature story
‘We Had Our Lives
on the Line’:
Abortion Activists Refl ect on 50 Years of Roe v. Wade
SASHA ROGELBERG | STAFF WRITER
T of history where women’s rights were still precarious
and when college students found power in protest,
not voting, which, at the time, was only permitted
for those 21 years and older. Wite-Out was one of the
more revolutionary technologies of the time.

“Th e way we had our voices heard was not through the
internet; it was not through cell phones,” Daniels said.

Matriculating to New York University in 1966,
Daniels lived in a dorm where men and women were
separated; women had an 11 p.m. curfew and had to
sign in every night before bed.

Her sophomore or junior year, student protesters
tore down the wall between the gendered dormi-
tories, which eventually resulted in the school cre-
ating co-ed dorms. Daniels attended the March on
Washington in 1969 and opposed the Vietnam War.

“We had our lives on the line,” she said.

Th ough her time in college was marked by the
civil rights era and the Vietnam War, the Kent State
Massacre, when members of the Ohio National Guard
opened fi re and killed four and injured nine Kent State
University students in 1970, changed her world.

College campuses, much like in spring 2020, shut
down. Daniels graduated from NYU in 1970 pass-fail.

In August 1970, women’s rights had taken center
stage in the country. Daniels traveled to Washington
for the Women’s Liberation March led by Gloria
Steinem and Betty Friedan. Th e march did not
explicitly address abortion access but began to open
the door for women to speak about their bodies more
openly, to talk about and understand sex, which was
stigmatized at best and demonized at worst.

urbazon / gettyimages
his year feels a lot like 1970 for those who
remember it.

Memories of a controversial war with
consequences felt in the United States and a divided
country is unwelcome for those who experienced
the beginning of the Vietnam War and the series
of Marches on Washington, where waves of people
gathered to fi ght for civil rights.

Th e past weeks have stirred up more memories
than some of these elders had bargained for.

Aft er Politico published on May 2 the 98-page
Supreme Court draft by Justice Samuel Alito that
would overrule the 1973 case of Roe v. Wade,
Americans pored over the document, some applaud-
ing, others taking to the streets to express their dis-
content with the majority opinion.

Th e Jewish community was well–represented
among Americans in protest of the decision, which
would return the power to restrict access to legal
abortion to the states, almost imminently resulting
in the ban of abortion in the South and Midwest U.S.,
and potentially in Pennsylvania.

According to Senior Rabbi Daniel Burg of Beth
Am Synagogue in Baltimore, the new law of the land
would interfere with his interpretation of Jewish law,
which deems abortion permissible, as the life of the
pregnant parent takes precedence over the fetus.

“Each of us is created in the image of God, which
has infi nite value. Each of us is responsible for our
bodies, to treat them with high regard, and to treat one
another, as far as bodies, with high regard,” Burg said.

“Th at big takeaway from that is that we need to respect
the sovereignty of each person’s bodies with regard to
behaviors that are acceptable, according to Jewish law.”
Burg, a Reform-trained rabbi at a Conservative
synagogue, is not alone in his belief. Th e Orthodox
Union published a statement criticizing the Supreme
Court ruling, claiming that restrictions on abortion
would prevent the ability to protect the gestational
parent’s life, violated the Jewish principle of pikuach
nefesh, saving a life. Th e organization, however, did
not fully condemn the case and stated that it did not
advocate for “abortion on demand.”
On May 17, Burg and congregants, as well as doz-
ens of other Jewish organizations, will take to the
streets once more at the Jewish Rally for Abortion
Justice in Washington, D.C.

Th ough the march will take place only weeks aft er
the draft leak, it has been decades in the making,
with activists from half a century ago laying the
groundwork for the country’s next round of fi ghting
for abortion access and providing insights on how the
movement could look moving forward.

But the conversation around Roe v. Wade really
begins before the 1973 decision, Philadelphian Carol
Daniels, 73, claims.

Th e landmark court case was nestled in a period
20 MAY 12, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



“Everybody was called a ‘whore’ or
a ‘lesbian’ who participated in that
march,” Daniels said.

At the same time as the Boston
Women’s Health Book Collective pub-
lished “Our Bodies, Ourselves” in 1970,
an anatomy book written “by women
for women” to help open dialogue
around sex and biology, Daniels had
an abortion in New York, one of the
four states where abortion was legal at
the time. It was expensive, and her boy-
friend at the time refused to help pay.

In other areas of the country, women
were not as lucky as Daniels.

Liz Downing, now the vice president
of advocacy of the National Council
of Jewish Women of the Greater
Philadelphia Section, had friends who
had back-alley abortions in the same
era. The use of coat hangers — now a
symbol used by abortion access advo-
cates — left some friends injured and
others unable to bear children.

According to Downing, this wasn’t
unusual: “People knew people knew
people.” Organizing protests was a grassroots
effort of meeting friends in their liv-
ing rooms, hoping people would check
their mailboxes or pick up their land-
line telephones when protest plans
were in motion.

But even after the decision of Roe
v. Wade, victory for abortion access
activists was short-lived, with the 1992
Planned Parenthood of Southeastern
Pennsylvania v. Casey case, which
originated in Pennsylvania, all but
overturning Roe v. Wade.

Before the case was presented in
front of the Supreme Court in 1992, Kol
Tzedek synagogue member and health
care lawyer J. Kathleen Marcus worked
as a lawyer for the case when it went to
District Court, when she was a “little
baby lawyer, minutes post-bar exam.”
On the district level, the plaintiffs,
including Planned Parenthood, argued
against the commonwealth to deem five
provisions, which included women hav-
ing to get the consent of their male part-
ner to get an abortion, unconstitutional.

The plaintiffs won the case with the help
of Marcus, 59, who discovered that one
of the “mental health experts” the com-
monwealth brought to testify on their
behalf had, instead of a doctorate in psy-
chology, a degree in home economics.

“That led to this wonderfully detailed
decision, where Planned Parenthood
won every single aspect, except [declar-
ing parental consent for abortion
unconstitutional],” Marcus said. “And
so that was a near-perfect win.”
When the case went to the Third
Circuit Court of Appeals, however, the
District Court decision was partially
reversed. Marcus remembers reading
the decision confused and frustrated by
the author. It was written by then-Cir-
cuit Judge Alito.

By the time the case reached the
Supreme Court, the five original pro-
visions from the Pennsylvania govern-
ment were upheld. Planned Parenthood
v. Casey effectively overturned Roe v.

Wade, Marcus argued.

“In a sense, that was even more insid-
ious because it allowed for very restric-
tive state laws to be passed that have,
since ‘92, essentially eliminated abor-
tion in a huge swath of states,” she said.

Years later, Marcus signed an amicus
brief for a Louisiana case that banned
abortion. The brief was signed by
women lawyers and law students who
had received abortions — the begin-
nings of a growing trend of people
going public with personal experiences
of having an abortion.

“There are a number of things on the
‘choice’ side that have changed, and
one is the willingness of people to come
out and say, ‘I had an abortion, and
I’m not ashamed, and here’s my story,”
Marcus said.

In the past few years, celebrities such
as Phoebe Bridgers, Uma Thurman and
Stevie Nicks have shared their abortion
stories online, which Marcus believes is
a powerful tool.

But social media, which activists have
used to catapult mobilization efforts
and rally protesters on short notice, is
a double-edged sword, Downing said.

It’s also a place to witness vitriol and
misinformation. “There was a time of broadcast
news, which I miss very much, which
required that there be opposing sides,”
she said. “So I remember really appre-
ciating the fact that, when there was an
issue that was considered controversial,
the news media were responsible for
providing both sides of the argument.”
Daniels shares Downing’s ambivalence
toward social media, favoring face-to-
face conversations. She hopes to facilitate
an intergenerational dialogue in order to
inform the younger generation — hun-
gry idealists in her eyes — about her own
experiences. The conversations, in turn,
help to wash away some of the jaded feel-
ings Daniels has, watching history repeat
itself half a century later.

“It does give me hope,” Daniels said.

“Because you have foot power, and
I really believe that you have voting
power; you have your physical power,
your mental power, and you have a
desire to think about your future.” JE
Liz Downing at a Doylestown courthouse protests the Supreme Court draft
overturning Roe v. Wade.
Courtesy of Liz Downing
Norma McCorvey (Jane Roe) and her lawyer Gloria Allred on the steps of the
Supreme Court in 1989
Courtesy of Wikimedia Creative Commons
Carol Daniels and her husband at a protest in Philadelphia
Courtesy of Carol Daniels
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