Following the 40th anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision on January 22, 1973, which legalized abortion nationwide, today more than 250,000 people will gather in Washington D.C. for the annual March for Life. Since the decision was handed down, an estimated 55 million abortions have been performed in the United States -- roughly the combined populations of New York and California.

Tomorrow, on January 26th, Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, the Apostolic Nuncio to the United States, will be joining thousands in San Francisco for the Walk for Life West Coast and he will be reading a special message from Pope Benedict XVI.

With the legislature now in session, the California Catholic Conference continues to follow all bills that are introduced that present a threat to the life and dignity of its citizens, born and unborn. This week AB 154, Healing arts: reproductive health care (Atkins, D-San Diego) was introduced -- and if passed, would revive last year's push to greatly expand abortion access by allowing nurse practitioners and midwives to perform non-surgical abortions. A similar bill was defeated last year with the help of thousands of emails from members of the Catholic Legislative Network. As AB 154 gets assigned to committee, alerts will again be mailed. Please encourage those who do not currently receive alerts to do so by signing up for the Network here.  

Read how Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York sees hope in the commitment of young people to the culture of life in the Ultrasound Generation.  Learn more about the history of Roe v. Wade in Carol Hogan's new blog post, Forty Years---the Regrettable Anniversary of Roe v. Wade.

May 11, 2012 - (En Español) The following statement was issued today by Bishop Gerald Wilkerson, president of the California Catholic Conference concerning Parental Notification Initiative.

“We have received word from the sponsors of the Parental Notification Initiative (PNI) that they were not able to collect enough signatures necessary to ensure that the proposed constitutional amendment could qualify for the November ballot.

In an email sent to our office they announced:

“The signature gathering campaign to qualify the Californians for Parental Rights Parental Notification Constitutional Amendment did not succeed in obtaining the required 807,615 valid signatures necessary to qualify for the November 2012 ballot. Consequently, CPR did not submit signatures to the respective county Registrars of voters on Monday, April 30th (the end of the 150 day signature gathering time that began November 30, 2011).

We have good news.  SB 1338 Abortion (Kehoe, D-San Diego) was pulled by its author late on Friday afternoon - May 4, 2012.  SB 1338 would have allowed midlevel practitioners (nurses, certified midwives, physician’s assistants) to perform first trimester aspiration abortions

As you recall, it failed on a 4-4 vote in the Business & Professions Committee on April 26, thanks to two Republican Senators (Wyland and Emerson) and two Democratic Senators (Correa and Vargas) who voted no, and the absence of Republican Senator Strickland.

Senator Kehoe was granted reconsideration at that time—usually a formality—but we believe she intended to try and convince one of the Democratic Senators to change his vote.  Obviously, she was unsuccessful.

Not only did our Catholic Legislative Network members step up and email and call their Senators who sat on the two policy committees where it was heard, but earlier this week, hundreds of CLN called Senate Pro Tem President Darrell Steinberg to help forestall any last minute parliamentary maneuvering.

Thank you all for your advocacy on this issue.