On Wednesday evening, January 15, Henry Morgentaler left Toronto for a whirlwind tour of Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg. The day before, Tuesday January 14, Toronto pro-life strategists called for an “extra show of strength” at the Toronto abortuary --- with the result that, at one point, in the early afternoon, close to 300 pro-life protesters crowded the sidewalks at [...]
On Saturday, January 1, 1985, Henry Morgentaler placed an advertisement in The Montreal Gazette. “I need your help,” says the text nest to a photo of Morgentaler. “I am fighting for women’s rights to safe medical abortions against almost insurmountable odds: the governments with their unlimited power and money and a vocal, fanatical, right-wing group of anti-abortionists who use [...]
A de V Like everywhere else in Canada, P.E.I has been touched by the Morgentaler fever. At the beginning of January, Morgentaler announced that he intends to open an abortion clinic in every province. However, a report in the Island’s newspaper The Guardian (January 12) indicates that he would be in unfriendly country if he tried it in [...]
Genetic Counseling is that field of medicine which is involved in gathering genetic and family information in an effort to determine whether a particular couple would be likely to pass on certain genetic diseases to any future children. A risk ratio may be formulated and the couple would then decide whether or not to have children or perhaps they [...]
At New Year the bombing of abortuaries in the United States was featured on Canadian television and radio and on the front pages of Canadian newspapers. In Ontario the Morgentaler propaganda machine was working full speed and with maximum publicity. Naturally, the media was bound to seize upon the bombing of three abortuaries and counseling offices in Pensacola, [...]
AH In a jury trial concerned with the spreading of false news about the killing of Jews during World War II, the defense sought to keep Jews and Freemasons off the jury. Defense lawyer Douglas Christie of Vancouver, B.C., had proposed to question potential jurors to see whether they had an “open mind “about the Jewish holocaust. Consequently, he [...]
AH The Jury for Life postcard blitz has been a smashing success. On Monday, January 14, the count passed the one million mark and the Prime Minister’s office is still counting. New cards are arriving every day. Interim spoke to Pat Soenen past president of the Manitoba League for Life and one of the four Ad Hoc Committee members [...]
On November 15, Gerald Emmet Cardinal Carter issued a pastoral letter on abortion in response to the Morgentaler acquittal (November 8). During the federal election campaign, Morgentaler had attacked an earlier letter by the Cardinal, issued in August, arguing on television and radio, as he had done many times before, that abortion was opposed only by Catholics and, among Catholics, really only [...]
In 1974, Alphonse de Valk, the author of Mortality and Law in Canadian Politics: The Abortion Controversy, stated that "the new principles implied in the legislation of abortions will have a whole train of consequences, conscious and subconscious, foreseen and unforeseen, political and philosophical, personal and social. Together, these consequences will profoundly affect society and affect it not for the better, but [...]
The recent disclosure that vaccines were produced from tissues of aborted babies had three main pro-life reactions: the immediate one of repugnance; the second, "why were we not told?" the third, "what experimentation that we don't know about is going on now?" The answer to the last question is that human vivisection of live aborted babies is almost commonplace, even though it [...]
On December 4, 1984, Attorney-General Roy McMurtry announced that the Crown would appeal the jury's November 8th decision to acquit Morgentaler and his two medical associates, Robert Scott and Leslie Smoling. In a 17-page statement read to the Ontario Legislature, McMurtry explained that, "the case raises fundamental issues about the jury in our system of criminal justice." The "legal advice I received [...]
The Morgentaler acquittal of Thursday, November 8, 1984, had its reverberations on the "hill." Right-to-abortion supporters were quick to move, even though the Minister of Justice (Hon. John Crosbie, St. John's West) had stated already that he did not foresee any changes because "there is no social consensus." (Toronto Star, Nov. 9). The following statements are taken from Hansard. Addressing herself to [...]
Ontario's Attorney-General Roy McMurty addressed the Ontario Legislature on Tuesday, December 4, explaining his reason for appeal. The following are the relevant extracts from his address. After explaining that the decision to appeal was made on strictly legal grounds, the Attorney General stated the following: "The conduct of this case raises fundamental issues about the role of the jury in our system [...]
An appointment list, taken by police at Morgentaler's Toronto Harbord Street abortuary, showed that abortions - at $300 each - were scheduled once and sometimes twice every 30 minutes (according to police testimony, on October 23, at the Morgentaler trial). The day the Metro police raided the abortion clinic, 14 abortions were scheduled. For each abortion done, Morgentaler receives a $50 "consultation" [...]
Canadian newspapers reported recently that next year the first “foolproof” birth control drug will be distributed in Europe. “First foolproof post pregnancy birth control pill” read the Ottawa Citizen caption. (Dec. 5). “Foolproof pill ready next year,” said the Toronto Sun. The Winnipeg Free Press, however, headed its short news item more accurately: “Abortion pill safe, labs say.” (Dec. 4). [...]