The Silent Majority: Harvard's Unusually Quiet Debate About Abortion

It's nine-thirty on a chilly morning in January, and four Harvard students are yelling at the tops of their lungs. Their voices form a single chant with a dozen other demonstrators: "Not the Church, not the state, women must decide their fate."

The issue of abortion, barely visible on the Harvard campus, is hotly debated here--at Boston's Planned Parenthood-- every second Saturday of the month. An unlikely medley of college students, women activists, anti-abortion Catholics, Planned Parenthood escorts and police officers fill the sidewalk outside the Commonwealth Ave. facility.

Sixty members of an anti-abortion Catholic prayer group hold a full mass, sing hymns and praying for the unborn children that they believe to be the victims of legalized abortion.

A smaller group of about fifteen activists from the National Organization for Women (NOW) and four members of Harvard Students for Choice (SFC) hold signs that ask passing cars to honk for choice and try to drown out Catholic hymns with their chants.

Meanwhile, most Harvard students--self-proclaimed supporters of legalized abortion--are asleep in their warm beds back in Cambridge.

In the past few years, though, a few die-hard activists opposed to abortion on demand--including a newly formed anti-abortion student group--are clamoring about the issue.

The Numbers

A recent Crimson poll on political beliefs showed abortion to be one of the least controversial issues on campus. Of the 294 students polled, 77 percent, or 225, said they were opposed to the banning of elective abortion.

And yet, while 120 students polled said they "strongly disagree" with banning elective abortion, the pro-choice group SFC boasts a core membership of only 15 to 20 people.

Members of SFC say that even those students who agree with them don't feel abortion is an especially controversial issue.

"Most people who consider themselves pro-choice would not get involved because of Roe v. Wade," says SFC member Emily M. B. Gann '01.

According to Gann, people think the 1973 court ruling that legalized abortion ended the fight--especially on college campuses.

But now, a newly formed anti-abortion group is ready to launch a campus-wide campaign about the issue and is determined that it become central to campus debate.

UHS's Little Secret

Debates about abortion did arise briefly last year, when now third-year Harvard Law Student Daniel H. Choi '94 publicized that part of each student's yearly $711 University Health Services (UHS) health fee subsidizes elective abortions.

Students can request that the part of their fee used for abortions be returned, but Choi complained that since so few students know about the policy, the refund option is rarely used. The refund option is publicized in UHS materials, but Choi felt not prominently enough.

"I wasn't really trying to make a pro-life argument," says Choi, "I was trying to get Harvard to respect religious diversity as much as ethnic and sexual orientation diversity."

Choi points out that the cost per person is insignificant--UHS gave him 86 cents when he requested a refund--but said students who might be morally opposed to abortion deserve to be better informed about where their money goes.

Although a clause explaining how students can receive a refund if they harbor strong moral or religious objections to abortion is only three mouse clicks away from UHS's home page, Choi still felt the issue deserved more visibility

An Oct. 30, 1998 editorial authored by Choi in The Crimson prompted a number of students, including Robert J. Ortiz '00, to mount an immediate response.

For Ortiz, who was then a member of Catholic Students' Association Pro-Life Committee, the issue was far too sensitive to be thrown together with the rest of UHS literature that few people take the time to read.

"It's so important to me, and I didn't know about [the UHS policy] until last year," Ortiz says.

Ortiz, a Pforzheimer resident, started a refund drive in his own House, distributing generic refund-request letters that students could sign and send in to UHS.

This spring, Ortiz hopes to expand the refund drive campus-wide. He's helping to form as a new anti-abortion group, Harvard Right To Life (HTRL). A vice president and founding member, Ortiz will try to re-introduce the issue to an overwhelmingly pro-choice Harvard campus.

Down But Not Out

Though HRTL's leaders acknowledge their beliefs are in the distinct minority at Harvard, they believe that with more information they can still bring more people to their side of the debate.

"I definitely think that we're in the minority, but not terribly", says HRTL president and founding member of Melissa R. Moschello '02.

Moschello believes that many students share a basic sense that abortion is wrong but may not feel comfortable becoming vocal about their beliefs.

And the religious rhetoric that frequently accompanies anti-abortion campaigns also scares many students away, she says. The HRTL group was in fact formed by several members of Catholic Students' Association Pro-Life Committee who had discovered that the Harvard's former prime anti-abortion organization, the Harvard and Radcliffe Alliance for Life, had become defunct.

"We thought it was necessary to have a regular, secular group for the pro-life position, because we don't think it's simply a religious issue," says Moschello.

Moschello says that she herself took a stance against abortion only when she looked into the issue and decided that there was overwhelming evidence that abortion destroyed human life.

Visbility Zero?

Ortiz says that a largely pro-choice campus is even more in need of an informational campaign.

"I guess the [Crimson] poll result doesn't surprise me that much, because this is generally considered to be a liberal campus," he says. "This just confirms our belief that we have to open up the dialogue on campus, because if student opinion is going to change about this we can't just ignore it."

Over intercession, HRTL will be gearing up for a major UHS refund drive. They will distribute pamphlets explaining UHS policy to all Harvard students. The pamphlets will also include a sample refund-request letter that students will be able to sign and send to UHS, according to Ortiz.

HRTL also plans to set up information tables outside of the Science Center and to ask UHS to make the issue even more obvious to both current and incoming students.

Moschello says that the next step will be to meet directly with UHS and ask them to send a letter to all incoming students explaining the policy so that they can opt out of contributing to abortions before entering Harvard.

Members of HRTL will also be holding protests outside of Planned Parenthood in Boston, according to Moschello.

As for now, however, core HRTL membership remains steady at 15 to 20 students, similar to SFC, although HRTL secretary Bronwen C. McShea '02 says that there are currently 100 students on the group's mailing list.

Many of the members are also part of the Pro-Life committee of the Catholic Student's Association, and Moschello and McShea are both former co-chairs.

But McShea says that shared membership won't prevent the two groups from finding different roles on campus.

"The Pro-Life Committee has shifted away to working within the Church," says McShea. HRTL will take on a more activist approach to the issue through events on campus.

According to McShea, the group would like to hold a forum with anti-abortion speakers, and possibly even a student debate against SFC.

The Vocal Few

But SFC Community Outreach Chair Roona Ray '02 says that a student debate is unlikely anytime in the near future.

"We weren't averse to doing a joint project [with HRTL]," says Ray. But she adds that a debate featuring only students would be inadequate. Instead, she suggests that a panel of professors and activists could focus on broader women's issues, providing a more beneficial dialogue for the campus.

A panel focusing on abortion only, however, is scheduled to take place at the Institute of Politics' Arco Forum in March.

"We're hoping to have speakers who have been in the issue from the very beginning, since Roe v. Wade, so that we can not only engage in a civil dialogue, but also bring a historical perspective to abortion in America," says Christopher M. Kirchoff '01, a member of the IOP's Student Advisory Committee.

Meanwhile, Ray says that although SFC is certainly a place for people who have identified themselves as pro-choice to express their views through activism, SFC also has a larger educational agenda.

"I think we provide educational resources for the greater Harvard Community, to those who may not be aware of reproductive rights issues," Ray says.

And although the campus is strongly pro-choice, SFC has at times seen strong reactions to their efforts.

"We've had incidents where we've put up signs that were taken down immediately," Gann says.

On the whole, Gann says that while the group tries to reach out to the student community, many people aren't getting involved because the general perception is that abortion is protected by law.

"Roe v. Wade is tenuous. It's being attacked all the time," she says, "Politically, there's a lot going on; Congress is trying to get things barred."

And while SFC leaders would like for more students to get involved in their efforts, members say they are comfortable knowing the majority of the campus is behind them.

Nationally Speaking

General indifference to abortion at Harvard may reflect a growing trend in national politics. While the media has often identified abortion as the hot-button issue that divides the nation politically, Anna G. Greenberg, assistant professor of public policy at the Kennedy School of Government, says the issue does not affect how people vote in presidential elections.

"Economic consideration and party identification are far more important," she says. "The media thinks that [abortion] is a bigger issue than it is."

Abortion can become a larger issue in primary politics, Greenberg says, where candidates are trying to appeal to views within their party rather than to the general electorate, but come November the issue recedes into the background.

According to Greenberg, younger Americans tend to support abortion rights more readily than their elders, who are frequently more religious.

But a recent Crimson poll shows abortion and religiosity may not be linked at Harvard. Just over half of the student body identified itself as religious, even though an overwhelming majority supported abortion rights.

Regardless, those who advocate against abortion at Harvard simply want their views to be heard.

"I'm not a strong pro-lifer but I respect pro-life beliefs, and I think they should be given more consideration by the College," says Choi.