Lawmakers Lining Up For Pa. Fight

July 04, 1989|by STEPHEN DRACHLER, The Morning Call

Pennsylvania's Capitol will again become an abortion war zone when legislators return from their summer recess in September.

Rep. Stephen Freind, the leading advocate of restricting women's access to abortions, said yesterday the Supreme Court's decision in a Missouri case gives abortion opponents the go-ahead to make access even more difficult.

Legislation will be introduced in the fall to put more hurdles in front of women seeking an abortion, Freind said, with the Delaware County Republican hoping that next year the court will reverse Roe vs. Wade, the landmark 1973 case that made abortion legal.

But proponents of a woman's right to end an unwanted pregnancy, stung by yesterday's ruling and implications that further restrictions lie ahead, vowed aCourt's ruling yesterday appears to uphold similar provisions in the Missouri case.

"The court has tossed back into the political fray of the state legislatures the deeply personal and private decision of a woman to have an abortion," Ritter said. "No longer can citizens rely on the Supreme Court to uphold its own legal precedents or the fundamental notion of privacy.

"We are now fighting against the Supreme Court, a Republican administration in Washington and a Democratic administration in Harrisburg," said Ritter. President Bush supports reversing Roe vs. Wade, as does Gov. Robert P. Casey, who signed the state's abortion control act last year.

"They may have the momentum. We have the numbers," Ritter said, contending that an overwhelming majority of Americans favor a woman's right to have an abortion but