Meanwhile a nationwide campaign by the right is also under way in the United States to reverse a 1973 Supreme Court decision legalising abortion. Dr. Kenneth Edelin, a black doctor from Boston, Massachusetts, convicted of manslaughter for performing a legal abortion on 15 February, is caught in the midst of an escalation of attacks by anti-abortion forces throughout the U.S.
His conviction by an all white jury was a victory for the opponents of the international response from all those the rights of Blacks and women.
The response among the pro-abortion forces to Edelin's conviction was rapid. At short notice, 2,000 women and men, many of them Black. demOn 20 March, a rally in defence of Edelin, held in Boston, received wide support from women's liberation groups and civil rights and civil liberties organisations.
In March this year 118 anti-abortion bills went before Congress. In Massachusetts alone, eight bills are under consideration by the State legisla ture which would change the law from allowing abortions only 'with the husband's consent' to making abortion "first-degree murder if performed after the foetus was "viable"
Women around the world are centering their efforts in the fight to win tring their efforts on the fight to wih demonstration on 21 June in Britain against the James White Amendment Bill showed that women in this coun try are determined to defend and extend their rights on abortion.
The cases of Dr. Morgentaler and Dr. Edelin emphasise the international character of the offensive by the right-to-life movement.
It also emphasises the need for an who oppose the current offensive by racists and reactionaries to deny women the right to control their own