Blog of Rights
Louise
Melling
01/22/2009

Common Hopes

By Louise Melling, Center for Liberty at 1:56pm

(Originally posted on Daily Kos.)

"We may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction — towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren."

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12/05/2008

Toward a Universal Declaration of Reproductive Freedom

By Louise Melling, Center for Liberty at 12:17pm

To reach our full potential as human beings, each of us must be free to make personal and private decisions about our lives free from unwarranted government intrusion. With whom do we form intimate relationships and enjoy a private sexual life? Will we have children? Raise a family? When and with whom? At their core, these questions and whether we live in a society that respects and supports our right to decide for ourselves how best to answer them profoundly shapes the contours of our lives. In this foundational sense, reproductive freedom is a basic human right.

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11/05/2008

Decisive Victories for Reproductive Freedom

By Louise Melling, Center for Liberty at 12:57pm

What an incredible night. Voters in South Dakota, Colorado, and California stopped three ballot measures that would have seriously threatened the ability of women and families to make private health care decisions. While these initiatives were fought vote-by-vote in each state, they were battles that were won for all of us.

The victories were decisive: in South Dakota, the split was 55 to 45 percent against a ban on nearly all abortions, and in Colorado, 73 to 27 percent said no to an amendment that would have not only prohibited abortions but could have been used to block stem cell research and curtail access to in vitro fertilization and certain forms of contraception, among other reproductive health services.

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09/17/2008

Reproductive Freedom and the Promise of Equal Opportunity

By Louise Melling, Center for Liberty at 12:48pm

In her searing dissent in the most recent reproductive rights case to go before the U.S. Supreme Court — Gonzales v. Carhart (2007) — Justice Ginsburg wrote, "[A]t stake in cases challenging abortion restrictions is a woman's 'control over her [own] destiny.'"

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08/26/2008

Proposed Bush Regulation Jeopardizes Women's Health

By Louise Melling, Center for Liberty at 11:21am

(Originally posted on Daily Kos.)

Last Thursday the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released proposed regulations (PDF) that could seriously undermine women's access to reproductive health services, including birth control and abortion. Now the public has 30 days to let the Bush administration know precisely what we think of these regulations. Click here for our Action Alert, which will allow you to send comments to HHS.

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04/27/2007

A Decision That Will Spark Activism

By Louise Melling, Center for Liberty at 10:04am
"[T]he Court deprives women of the right to make an autonomous choice, even at the expense of their safety."

, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in her dissent to Gonzales v. Carhart.


"I'm ecstatic. It's like someone gave me $1 million and told me, Leslee, go shopping. We're brainstorming, and we're having fun."

, Leslee Unruh, one of the architects of last year's failed attempt to ban nearly all abortions in South Dakota, explaining her reaction to the Supreme Court decision in Gonzales v. Carhart.

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