Susy Prochazka, Thomas Jefferson School of Law

For the lonely hearts, the coupled hearts, and all hearts in between this Valentine’s Day, our chapter arranged a lecture on the history of human sexuality and the ongoing effects of racism, sexism, and homophobia on sexual expression. Ms. Lea, the owner of a local sexuality boutique and sociological scholar, prepared a discussion on the lingering negative stereotypes surrounding a woman’s sexuality, especially where that sexuality does not conform to a white, hetero-normative standard.

Understandably so, the discussion detoured from a historical perspective into the more recent hardships that women face in exercising their right to a healthy and autonomous sexuality. One member of our chapter posed the question, “How will the recent obstacles to contraception coverage affect women’s sexuality?” Building on a religious liberty platform, the campaign by US Bishops forced the White House to compromise on insuring contraception. We voiced our fears that forcing women to rely on their employers for coverage will further restrict timely access to birth control. A woman’s sexual health will be dependent on her employer’s personal beliefs and opinions, an unacceptably restrictive limitation, in our eyes.

Some of the most vociferous opposition to the coverage of contraceptives stem from conservative religious organizations. However, there are statistics that 98 percent of sexually active Catholic women use a method of contraception banned by these same US bishops. The bishops represent the views of very few people other than themselves. One of our members is a devout Catholic and an active participant with Catholics for Choice. She brought these statistics to our attention and this led to a fiery debate about the failure of the separation of Church and State.

In the end, our discussion gave us resolve to create an event to emphasize the fact that religion and contraceptives can co-exist. Our school is fairly conservative, both politically and religiously, and we seek to ensure a place for contraceptives and frank discussion on campus.

To accomplish this, our LSRJ chapter has teamed up with the Jewish Students Association and Christian Law Society to host an event addressing the dissonance between religion and contraceptives, a conflict that is being pushed to the forefront.

Our Valentine’s Day event was a huge success. It not only provided a background to the history of oppression of sexuality, but it also addressed the obstacles that very recent legislation continues to pose.

Joanne Caceres, Harvard Law School

A common theme among the varied speakers at last Saturday’s northeast regional conference was the unmistakable surge in anti-choice legislation throughout the country last year, and its ongoing momentum. Despite a victory in Mississippi, Personhood Amendments are being introduced in many states, and that is just one of many legislative trends with anti-choice consequences. Even ignoring the Personhood Amendments, many of these laws have the chilling potential to effectively shut off access to abortion in states that could already be described as being in crisis. On everyone’s mind in light of these developments were two interrelated questions: 1) how did we get to this state? and 2) what can we do to stem the tide?

Many organizations are challenging the unjustly restrictive laws in courts around the United States. While this continues to be monumentally important, there appears to be a growing understanding that necessary change will come when people are mobilized around reproductive freedom. The role that local organizing and grassroots movements can play is apparent, especially among younger voters.

The millennium generation is perceived as generally being more likely to be pro-choice, but the minority that are anti-choice are more likely to vote and organize around this issue. Therefore, the challenge for the reproductive rights and justice movement is to engage a broader base that can become active voices in the discourses of today and tomorrow. From this same base, the movement needs to identify and cultivate new leaders, and support them in their bids for roles in local governments. Hopefully, this strategy can lead to positive changes in the present and also build for a more just future.

It was an inspiration to meet the men and women who are working to promote the values of reproductive rights and justice everyday in the face of the many challenges that we face today. We were reminded, however, that one need not only focus on reproductive justice work to help the movement. Current litigation requires expertise in tax, insurance, and administrative law, and lawyers in these fields could provide critical support to the movement. So to other LSRJ students, I think the message I’d most like to impart from the conference is this: think creatively, and you can be a force for change wherever your career takes you. 

Between the slippery slope of imperial protectionism and cultural relativism, progress appears to be made as Female Genital Cutting  is declining in various countries on the African continent.

As you may have heard Karen Handel of the Susan G. Komen Foundation resigned. Check out the link to the official resignation letter.

One immigration hurdle removed for API women and their families.

Central Pennsylvania’s Shippensburg University puts Plan B in campus vending machines. Go SU!!!

Young Women United a part ACRJ’S Strong Families program, just got a resolution passed to celebrate young parents in their state of New Mexico! Looking forward to August 25^th!

A Colorado Planned Parenthood program–Sext Ed. Love it!

Candace Gibson, University of Utah College of Law

*This post is part of a series written in support of Trust Women Week Silver Ribbon Campaign and the online virtual march from January 20-27. LSRJ is proud to partner with numerous orgs across the country – join the march by sending a message to your lawmakers today! And check back here throughout the week for more posts.

In May 2009, a 17-year-old girl in Naples, Utah, was pregnant.  She was charged with second-degree felony criminal solicitation to commit murder.  Why was she charged? She solicited a man to punch her in the stomach so that she would miscarry.  He accepted $150 from her, took her to the basement of his parent’s house, and kicked her in the stomach five times.  According to the young girl, who is now a young adult, she solicited the assault because her boyfriend threatened to break up with her if she did not terminate her pregnancy.  A juvenile court dismissed her case in 2009, but the Utah Supreme Court this past December reversed their decision.  They reasoned that an assault does not meet the statutory definition of abortion and now this young woman may face criminal penalties for this tragic incident in her life.

I don’t disagree with the Utah Supreme Court in saying that abortion as imagined by our state’s legislators is a medical procedure, although the term “medical” will most likely be co-opted by the Anti-Choice movement to exclude abortions achieved through pharmaceuticals (see the case of an Idaho woman who terminated her own pregnancy by ordering RU486 online and was charged  with a felony).  What I do disagree with is the numerous laws passed by state legislatures to restrict abortion services to the point that Roe v. Wade doesn’t make any impact in the lives of women who need it the most.  Remember what Justice Ginsburg said at the Aspen Institute in 2010, “If the court were to change its mind . . . the only women who would be truly affected are poor women. Because even at the time before Roe, women who wanted abortions could have a safe, legal abortion.”  The problem is, this great Justice has forgotten that most poor women still can’t have abortions because of the Hyde Amendment.

This young woman in Utah should have had the right to decide to be a parent, to give her born child up for adoption, or to have an abortion without emotional abuse from her boyfriend or having to deal with the heinous consequences and obstacles of laws that ultimately regulate abortions out of existence.  As the Guttmacher Institute said in their awesome video, “There will always be women who need abortions.”

This is the last in a series of reflection posts by our outgoing (and inaugural) class of Reproductive Justice Fellows. Visit the RJFP page for more information about the program.

Reflecting on my fellowship year at the Rebecca Project for Human Rights is really wonderful.  Not only do I feel that I’ve honed the skills required for fierce policy advocacy here in DC, but I also witnessed and participated in some truly remarkable moments.

As a Law and Policy Fellow at a small organization, I learned the necessity of being a sort of Jill-of-all-trades – remaining strategic and hard-working, but able to adapt on a dime.  There was never a dull moment as I attended hearings, briefings, spoke at events, participated in roundtables and coalitions, researched and wrote policy papers, developed fact sheets and talking points, and planned events (to name a few).

But, it was my experience working with our mother advocates and girl leaders-in-training that affected me most.  Within a month of starting as a Fellow, I aided in bringing members from our national network of mother leaders to the Hill.  Most of these mothers had never before done advocacy, and had certainly never been to DC.  Watching them find empowerment in their lived experience while talking to Representatives, Senators, and staffers was absolutely amazing.

Here in DC we work every day with access – to policymakers, to stakeholders, to power.  I’ve learned the language of that access in my Fellowship year; learned how to make it work.  But I feel very lucky to have learned it through the eyes of those mothers with whom I first visited the Hill.  I will always, always carry a mother or a girl with me – spiritually and figuratively – when I do this work.  Because in RJ, we work to amplify, translate, and represent those that do not speak the language of access, so that justice really is for all.

Jessi Leigh Swenson

2010-2011 RJ Fellow at the Rebecca Project for Human Rights

When I began my fellowship at the National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum (NAPAWF), I was thrilled to work for a progressive multi-issue organization whose focus was on API women and girls. Like many social justice advocates in law school, I had a hard time with the limited discussion of underlying factors which result in inequity that is glossed over during lectures in which we master the law of contracts, civil procedure, property, torts, and criminal procedure during our first year. I was so excited to find and join the Law Students for Reproductive Justice Chapter at my law school. Through the group, I found a space in which to create events and programs that fed my passion for social justice. I was also able to begin to connect the dots between legal theory and reality of communities.

I was thrilled to have the chance to continue that work in a professional capacity. What I soon discovered was that I was going to be living the idea that we become what we are seeking. At various point in my legal career, I wondered where the voices of women of color and low income people were, why they were not part of decision making that had a direct impact on their lives. During my fellowship year, I soon became consumed with increasing the voice and visibility of API women and girls. I did this through creating fact sheets, helping to mobilize our members to contact their representatives about various bills, working with coalitions on various pieces of legislation, participating in administrative advocacy around implementation of the affordable care act, and conducting legislative visits about the implications of various bills on API women and girls. I also had several moments of celebrity encounters for nerds as I got to be in the same space as the President, First Lady, Supreme Court Justices, advocates whose work I have admired, and members of Congress. I also feel like a big shot as I got to attend receptions, conferences, and meetings at the West Wing, Capitol and various congressional offices. I even had a moment of being tongue tied when I was in a meeting with Kalpen Modi.

My experience with public speaking was the biggest surprise of the year. I got to face my fear of public speaking pretty frequently. The challenge got heightened when I was speaking on topics that I knew the audience did not fully agree with me on and/or did not know much about; I felt like I was learning a dance in which I had to get people interested in the topic and then in agreement on the things we had in common. What began as an area in which I needed improvement turned into one of my strongest skills. I had become the voice I wanted to hear more of during my legal career. I also realized that transforming a perceived weakness into an actual strength was a way that I internalized NAPAWF’s work on increasing voice and visibility of API women and girls. During presentations, I inserted a bit of my personal story. During workshops on transforming a culture of son preference, I worked to make room for participants to share their story. The ways in which API women as a community and as individuals are seen and heard is when we speak our truth even when our voices shake and knots form in our stomach. Transformation does not wait for perfection; it needs action to be realized. Thank you LSRJ for the privilege of being part of the inaugural class and thank you funders for making it possible for me to have such an amazing year! As I go forward in my legal career, I know that the experiences I had at NAPAWF will make me a better advocate.

Jaspreet Chowdhary (’10 Seattle University School of Law)

2010-2011 RJ Fellow at the National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum

Last weekend I was grabbing drinks with a friend who used to work “in the movement” and she asked me, “So what’s going on with our reproductive rights? Are we doing anything about this?” As I started to explain the important work advocates are doing and my optimism about the fate of reproductive justice policy in the long-term, I found myself recounting many of the experiences I had during my fellowship year.

I was placed with the Women’s Health and Rights Program at the Center for American Progress (CAP). CAP is a think tank that develops new policy ideas, critiques policy that stems from conservative values, and challenges the media to cover the issues that truly matter and shape the national debate. The Women’s Health and Rights Program incorporates a reproductive justice framework into this work.

My fellowship year has been filled with invaluable opportunities for learning and growth thanks to the Director of the Women’s Health & Rights Program, Jessica Arons, and Senior Fellow Shira Saperstein, who are incredibly smart, quick, thoughtful, and creative (hence my aforementioned optimism).  But one of the most significant takeaways from my year at CAP is about the importance of collaboration.

It seems obvious, right? It is, especially since I’m not new to the DC machine. Yet CAP’s unique organizational structure – various teams and sub-teams divided by policy area, each with experts in the given field – gave me a lesson in how to strategically collaborate with seemingly un-usual suspects.

One example of this type of cross-cutting collaboration was on the issue of access to abortion for women in the military. Much has been done by reproductive rights and justice advocates to argue that servicewomen deserve coverage for the full range of reproductive health services. Congress gets it – the “women’s rights-ers” don’t like military health care. Perhaps we could use an additional messenger.

Enter Lawrence Korb, a Senior Fellow for CAP’s national security team and seasoned military expert.  Among other things, Korb served as Assistant Secretary of Defense during the Reagan Administration. He also thinks the military’s health care for servicewomen is inadequate. Thanks to this connection, the unlikely voice of a former Department of Defense official is speaking out about the DoD’s unfair reproductive health policy. (Read Korb’s op-ed here).

I was able to collaborate with many other teams at CAP on reproductive justice issues – not only broadening the available expertise, but also broadening the audience. Every little bit helps in this town. I am grateful to Jessica and Shira and LSRJ for showing me that although issues may appear siloed, there are opportunities for strategic collaborations!

Alex Walden (’10 University of San Francisco School of Law)

2010-2011 RJ Fellow at the Center for American Progress

This is the third in a series of reflection posts by our outgoing (and inaugural) class of Reproductive Justice Fellows. Click here and here for the first and second entries and visit the RJFP page for more information about the program.

Hard to believe an entire year has gone by!  It was just a year ago that I graduated law school, sat for the bar exam, and moved to the DC area.  As I finish my last full week at my host organization, the Asian & Pacific Islander American Health Forum (APIAHF), I find myself reflecting on the amazing year I’ve had in the policy world and the wonderful start to my career this provided.

As a fellow at APIAHF, I’ve been immersed in the world of health policy, working on a number of exciting issues, including the recently passed Affordable Care Act, or Health Care Reform.  Over the past year, I’ve been able to see firsthand how federal policy is made, including through legislative and administrative advocacy.  I’ve become friends with the Federal Register, a goldmine of information for all things federal, and learned the importance of making sure the voices of underserved communities are heard.

My time at APIAHF has been a whirlwind and has felt like policy boot camp.  I couldn’t have come to DC at a better time to work on health care issues, and I am excited for the newest LSRJ fellow to continue where I’ve left off.  I am indebted to LSRJ for funding this once in a lifetime experience, as well as my supervisor who gave me the support and strength to push myself each day.

Amina Farhadi (’10 UNC School of Law)

2010-2011 RJ Fellow at the Asian & Pacific Islander American Health Forum

This is the second in a series of reflection posts by our outgoing (and inaugural) class of Reproductive Justice Fellows. Click here for the first entry and visit the RJFP page for more information about the program.

Has it already been a year?  Although the bar exam seems like ages ago, it feels like I just moved to D.C. to start my LSRJ fellowship.  My placement was with the National Health Law Program (NHeLP), an organization that works to further access to quality health care for low-income individuals and underserved populations, primarily by providing legal expertise on Medicaid.

Looking back over the year, I am amazed at how much I learned.  When I started at NHeLP, I knew next to nothing about Medicaid.  There was so much to learn – and I was almost certain I would never be able to grasp the complexities in this area of law by the end of my fellowship.

Then, at around six months in, things began to click.  For the remainder of my fellowship, I actively contributed to policy strategy, and I finished research in almost half the time than when I started.  It was also around this time that I began feeling comfortable training and presenting on Medicaid coverage of reproductive health care.  Better yet, others at outside organizations began calling me for advice and input on issues around Medicaid and health care reform.

Now as my fellowship comes to an end and I prepare to transition into my new role as staff attorney, I am looking forward to helping the new LSRJ fellow learn the ropes.  I am incredibly grateful to LSRJ and am proud to have been part of the inaugural fellowship class.  Thank you LSRJ!

Davida Silverman (’10, CUNY School of Law)

2010-2011 RJ Fellow at the National Health Law Program

Thanks to my amazing host organization, the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health, my fellowship year has been amazing and I am sad it is ending so soon. On any given morning, I am throwing on a pair of heels and walking over to my first meeting. In that meeting, I sit around a conference table with ten other attorneys who know the games in DC; they know everyone in the administration and everyone in Congress. In this meeting, we create a plan for drafting official comments to Health and Human Services encouraging them to consider certain facts about women in the new health care reform. I add information about the health disparities that Latinas face.

Afterward, I grab the metro and pop up to Capitol Hill where I meet another group of activists in front of a Senators office. We gather the briefs we have been writing, confirm our agenda and then go in and introduce ourselves. We sit down with the Senator’s lead attorney to explain our issue. In this particular meeting, the Senator comes in after her vote on the Senate floor and sits down with us. She confirms that she does support this issue, appreciates the information we gathered, and explains that she is interested in speaking on the floor on behalf of women of color on this issue. Great! We let her know that we are prepared to help. Now, we have to go, we have two more meetings. Number two goes well, but the last is horrible and the legislative assistant is less than kind and barely lets us speak at all. There isn’t too much time to dwell on it. I’ve got to get back to the office to work on a memo that is due to my supervisor on yet another issue. It’s now 5:30pm and we have an invitation to see President Obama speak at a galla for immigrant rights, its time to thrown on a dress and make my way to the event. After waiting until the very end of the event to be sure to shake hands with the President, it is time to get home before it all starts again tomorrow.

This has been my life for the last year as an LSRJ Legal Fellow. It has been a non-stop whirl wind of advocacy work. I have had so many once-in-a-lifetime experiences in this one year that they are impossible to count. I have learned from the best about how to advocate for the most disadvantaged people in our communities, especially women and people of color. These skills, and the confidence that came with their practice, have shaped me into the advocate I have dreamed of being.

I am endlessly grateful to my supervisors who integrated me into even the most important pieces of the work the organization does, to the LSRJ staff who were always available for mentoring, and the funders who made this year possible.

Dani Hawkes (’10, University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law)

2010-2011 RJ Fellow at the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health