Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion

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The Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion (CCS) was a group of American clergy that counseled and referred people to licensed doctors for safe abortions before the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade made abortion legal nationwide. [1] Started in 1967 by a group of 21 Protestant ministers and Jewish rabbis in New York City, the group operated out of Judson Memorial Church [2] and grew to incorporate chapters in thirty-eight states with some 3,000 clergy as members. [1] By the time of the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, it is estimated that the Clergy Consultation Service had nationally referred at least 450,000 people for safe abortions. [3] The Clergy Consultation Service also started Women's Services, an abortion clinic in New York City, in 1970 after statewide legislation made abortion legal in New York State. [1]

Contents

Origins

In the mid-1960s, a group of liberal New York Protestant ministers and Jewish rabbis met regularly at Washington Square Methodist Church to discuss questions of social justice. [4] [1] Starting in 1965, New York State Assemblyman Albert H. Blumenthal led an effort to reform state abortion laws. As reform efforts failed, journalist and abortion activist Lawrence Lader urged the clergy group to offer abortion referrals. [4]

The clergy group invited women who had had abortions, gynecologists, and lawyers from the New York Civil Liberties Union to speak to them and provide guidance for setting up the referral service. [3] The group set rules for their work: counselors must be clergy, to confer the right of confidentiality; they would counsel in person in their regular offices; they would refer only to licensed physicians; they would refer out of state, to confuse jurisdictions; and there would be no charge. [1]

The group appointed Rev. Howard Moody, minister of Judson Memorial Church, as spokesperson. They chose to use the word "abortion" in their name as a way to remove stigma. [1] They set up an answering machine at Judson with an outgoing message giving the names and contact information of two clergy available that week. Moody gave the group's first interview to the New York Times, and the article about their launch, naming the 21 clergy members, appeared on page 1 on May 27, 1967. [2]

The administrator of the New York City CCS, and, later, the national group, was Judson's church administrator, Arlene Carmen. She and other women visited many of the abortion providers themselves, posing as pregnant women, to check the clinical conditions and procedure used, as well as the demeanor of the doctors. Carmen maintained lists of approved physicians and those to be avoided. [1]

Expansion

The service received hundreds of calls during the first weeks of operation, including many from women outside of New York. [1] Since all counseling was done in person, the New York CCS soon identified a need for similar services elsewhere. [3] Moody asked clergy colleagues in Philadelphia and Chicago to start CCS chapters there. Clergy from New Jersey and Los Angeles read about the New York group and contacted them about forming local groups. [1] By 1972, there were chapters in 38 states, and by the time the Roe v. Wade decision made abortion legal nationwide in January 1973, some 3,000 CCS counselors had referred as many as 450,000 women for safe abortions. [1]

Successors

On July 1, 1970, abortion became legal in New York State. [5] On that day, the Clergy Consultation Service of New York opened the first freestanding outpatient abortion clinic in the U.S., the Center for Reproductive and Sexual Health (later known as Women's Services), under the medical direction of Dr. Hale Harvey III and the administration of graduate student Barbara Pyle. Harvey had performed abortions for CCS-referred patients in New Orleans and was invited by the CCS to set up the clinic in New York. [3] At Women's Services, abortions cost as little as $25 for patients in economic need, and women were referred there by CCS chapters throughout the east. [3]

At the same time, the New York CCS was concerned that demand for legal abortion in New York City would be much greater than hospitals were equipped to provide. Moody and Carmen established a watchdog group called Clergy and Lay Advocates for Hospital Abortion Performance, headed by Barbara Krasner. The group offered a referral to anyone who had difficulty getting an abortion at New York City hospitals and amassed statistics indicating that the hospital system did not provide timely treatment. [3]

In 1973, following Roman Catholic opposition to legalized abortion, a group of Protestant and Jewish clergy formed an education and advocacy organization, the Religious Coalition for Abortion Rights (RCAR), which in 1993 broadened to become the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC). Former CCS members around the country formed or joined state chapters of the group. [1]

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Abortion in the United States is legal, subject to balancing tests tying state regulation of abortion to the three trimesters of pregnancy, via the landmark 1973 case of Roe v. Wade, the first abortion case to be taken to the Supreme Court. Every state has at least one abortion clinic. However, individual states can regulate and limit the use of abortion or create "trigger laws", which would make abortion illegal within the first and second trimesters if Roe were overturned by the Supreme Court of the United States. Eight states—Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Michigan, Mississippi, Oklahoma, West Virginia and Wisconsin—still have unenforced pre-Roe abortion bans in their laws, which could be enforced if Roe were overturned. In accordance with the US Supreme Court case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), states cannot place legal restrictions posing an undue burden for "the purpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion of a nonviable fetus."

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Abortion in Illinois is legal. Laws about abortion dated to the early 1800s in Illinois, and it became a criminal offense for the first time in 1827. Illegal abortions date in the state date back to 1888. As hospitals set up barriers in the 1950s, the number of therapeutic abortions declined. Following Roe v. Wade in 1973, Illinois updated its existing abortion laws in late May 2019. By 2010, the state had a number of newer abortion limitations in place, including Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP). The state has seen a decline in abortion clinics over the years, going from 58 in 1982 to 47 in 1992 to 24 in 2014.

Abortion in Arizona is legal. 49% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. By 1950, abortion was a criminal offense in Arizona for women to solicit or have. By 2007, the state required mandatory ultrasounds before women could have an abortion. Abortion became illegal in Arizona in April 2012 after week 20. Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) existed by 2013. Republican Representative Michelle Udall introduced HB 2759 to Arizona's House with 20 other co-sponsors to provide $2.5 million annually for a period of three years to anti-abortion women's reproductive clinics as part of efforts to defund Planned Parenthood.

Abortion in Hawaii is legal. 66% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Hawaii began allowing abortion on demand de jure in 1970, the first state to do so. State law enacted at that time stated said, "the State shall not deny or interfere with a female's right to choose or obtain an abortion of a nonviable fetus or an abortion that is necessary to protect the life or health of the female."

Abortion in Idaho is legal. Idaho passed a law in the 2000s banning abortions after 22 weeks because it was alleged that a fetus can feel pain. Mandatory informed consent laws were in place by 2007. The cut off point for getting a legal abortion in the state was generally some point between week 24 and 28. This period uses a standard defined by the United States Supreme Court in 1973 with the Roe v. Wade ruling.

Abortion, also known as pregnancy termination, up to the 24th week of pregnancy was legalized in New York (NY) in 1970, three years before it was decriminalized for the entire United States with the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade in 1973. The Reproductive Health Act, passed in 2019 in New York, further allows for abortions past the 24th week of pregnancy if a woman's life or health are at risk, or if the fetus is not viable.

Abortion in North Dakota is legal. 47% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. By 1950, abortion or seeking an abortion was a criminal offense in the state. Informed consent laws were on the books by 2007. Informed consent materials said things like at 10 weeks, the fetus "now has a distinct human appearance" and that "eyelids are formed". The materials said at 14 weeks, the fetus "is able to swallow" and "sleeps and awakens". In March 2013, Gov. Jack Dalrymple of North Dakota signed into law a bill banned abortion at six weeks. More laws were passed in 2013 seeking to ban or limit abortions, and these eventually wound up at the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Abortion in Pennsylvania is legal up to the 24th week of pregnancy. 51% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases.

Abortion in Wisconsin is legal up to the 22nd week of pregnancy. 53% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. However, the Center for Reproductive Rights in its What if Roe Fell website labels the state as hostile towards abortion rights e.g., 20-week ban, telemedicine ban, TRAP requirements, admitting privileges requirement, transfer agreement requirement, reporting requirement, parental consent required, mandatory counseling, mandatory ultrasound and waiting period requirements.

Abortion in Maryland is legal. 64% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases.

Abortion in Puerto Rico is legal. Attitudes and laws in Puerto Rico relating to abortion have been significantly impacted by decisions of the federal government of the United States. Abortion effectively became legal in 1937 after a series of changes in the law by the Puerto Rico legislature based on introduction of Malthusian clinics introduced from US-initiated eugenic policies. During the 1960s and early 1970s, women from the mainland of the United States would travel to the island for legal abortions, with the practice largely ending in 1973 as a result of the US Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade. Women have continued to travel to Puerto Rico from other parts of the Caribbean since the 1990s to obtain abortions illegal in their home countries. The total number of abortion clinics on the island has been in decline since a peak of over a dozen in the 1990s.

Arlene Carmen was an American activist and church administrator in New York City. Raised in the Bronx in a Jewish family, she graduated from City College and became administrator of Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village in 1967. There she became administrator of the National Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion, a network of Protestant and Jewish clergy who referred women for safe abortions before Roe v. Wade legalized abortion nationwide. She herself vetted some of the physicians used by the group by posing as a pregnant woman, and she maintained lists of physicians who were approved and those who were to be avoided. She and Judson's head minister, Howard Moody, started a project to support sex workers, offering referrals, clothing, lemonade, and cookies. In 1978, she was arrested along with sex workers in Times Square and released 22 hours later. She was also an organizer an early AIDS support group at Judson. Carmen was co-author of Abortion Counseling and Social Change: From Illegal Act to Medical Practice with Howard Moody and Working Women: The Subterranean World of Street Prostitution with Howard Moody.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Dirks, Doris A. (Doris Andrea). To offer compassion : a history of the Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion. Relf, Patricia. Madison, Wisconsin. ISBN   9780299311308. OCLC   959080702.
  2. 1 2 Fiske, Edward B. (May 22, 1967). "CLERGYMEN OFFER ABORTION ADVICE: 21 Ministers and Rabbis Form New Group Will Propose Alternatives". New York Times. Retrieved March 27, 2019.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Arlene, Carmen. Abortion counseling and social change - from illegal act to medical practice: the story of the Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion. Moody, Howard, 1921-2012. Valley Forge, Pa. ISBN   081700579X. OCLC   539706.
  4. 1 2 Moody, Howard (2009). A Voice in the Village. Xlibris Corporation. ISBN   978-1-4363-9973-9.
  5. ↑ "Laws of the State of New York". Hathi Trust Digital Library. 1970. Retrieved February 15, 2022.
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