Pro-choice=Anti-Mafia?

Sara Rimensnyder | April 23, 2002

Are militant anti-abortion activists racketeering gangsters?

This fall the U.S. Supreme Court will hear two cases addressing that question. The cases-Scheidler v. NOW and Operation Rescue v. NOW-have been kicking around the court system since the 1980s. That's when the National Organization for Women first decided to find out whether the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), passed in 1970 to bust mobsters, might be applied to Operation Rescue's sometimes violent protest activity at abortion clinics.

With a few exceptions, the courts have ruled in NOW's favor, in decisions that many feel are dangerously close to trampling free speech rights. But yesterday's announcement that the Supreme Court will hear appeals suggests that some on the bench are dissatisfied with RICO's currently broad interpretation.

If NOW loses in the fall, it will suffer more than a strictly legal defeat; it will also surrender a potent symbolic device in defense of abortion rights. (Anti-abortion activists know more than a little about symbolism, too, often using highly visceral iconography in their protests.) The application of RICO-and more than a decade of judicial approval-rhetorically connects militant anti-abortion activists to the systematic violence of the Mafia, a group not exactly well known for its deep respect for life.