The response was slow in coming. The gravity of the assault was not at first recognized by the women's liberation movement.

But the protests held March 5–12 were an initial step in turning this around.

Ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. No restrictions on abortion. Defeat the Hyde amendment against Medicaid-funded abortions. End sterilization abuse. Full rights for pregnant workers. Implement affirmative-action plans. Restore child-care funds.

These were the demands raised by thousands of women in at least twenty-six cities.

In some places the actions protested a particular attack.

For instance in St. Paul at the last minute, the planned action was turned into a protest of an arson attack on an abortion clinic.

More than 300 people in Seattle demonstrated against an effort to rescind the ERA in Washington State.

These actions showed that women are beginning to see the need to defend their rights with a united response.

The women's movement should see the Hyde amendment as only the first attack on abortion rights. If the government is successful in denying poor and Black women abortions, it will try to outlaw abortions for all women.

The stake that Black, Chicana, and Puerto Rican women have in the fight against the attacks on women's rights was reflected by their participation in the International Women's Day events.

April 7, 1952
Another step toward establishing thought-control in the United States was completed last week when six persons were convicted in Baltimore on charges of violating the Smith Act.

The trial followed the same pattern as the previous political frame-up proceedings against the Communist Party, except in one respect: The judge took it on himself to give the jury a new interpretation of the Smith Act, ruling that mere membership in the Communist Party constitutes a crime under the Act.

Up to now, the government has been under the obligation to prove that Smith Act defendants actually and individually committed the offense charged--namely, that they "conspire to advocate" the overthrow of the government by force and violence.

If the new interpretation is allow to stand, then the witch hunt would get a new impetus and speed, for the government would no longer have to show anything but membership in the Communist Party or any other organization arbitrarily accused of violating the Smith Act.

Part of the blame for the acceleration of the witch hunt rests on the labor movement, especially those sections who understand the menace of the Smith Act and have called for its repeal.

Today the victims are members of the Communist Party, tomorrow it will be members of other organizations on the government's "subversive" blacklist, and the day after it will be members of the organizations that will be added to the blacklist by the police-statesmen in Washington.  
 
 
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