In the defense of the right to abortion, the Women's National Abortion Action Coalition (WONAAC) is sponsoring hearings on abortion in New York and other cities during the next two weeks.

New York State's law allows abortions up through the twenty-fourth week of pregnancy. Last spring antiabortion forces succeeded in forcing both the State Senate and the State Assembly to pass a bill calling for repeal of the liberalized law. Governor Nelson Rockefeller's veto of the bill preserved the right to abortion temporarily.

The two largest women's groups, the National Organization for Women (NOW) and the Women's Political Caucus, had thrown their energies into primary campaigns and did not mobilize their memberships to march on May 6. Some leaders in the women's movement, such as Betty Friedan, later expressed the belief that campaigning for legislators who "vote right" is the best way to win legal abortion.

Since then, the rejection of abortion rights planks at both the Democratic and Republican conventions has helped convince a number of abortion activists that independent political action is necessary.

October 27, 1947
Large scale communal rioting in the Punjab has only slightly abated. A mass of Hindu, Sikh, and Moslem refugees are on the move. What is the basis of the riots?

The problem of the Punjab must be clearly separated from the rest of India. In dividing India, British imperialism, supported by both Hindu and Moslem feudal-capitalists, paid no attention to the nationalists as such. Artificially, the country was divided, severing indigenous language groups into different provinces. This operation was calculated with the object of dividing the country in order to keep the imperialist stranglehold. Thus, the Punjab, where Hindus, Moslems and Sikhs speak the same language with a unified economy, was divided into two provinces. Similarly the Bengal was partitioned, and the whole scheme was put into operation without voting of any kind.

In Bombay, sporadic riots admittedly engineered by the "Goondas" (contemptuous term for declassed elements) have been taking place since September, 1946. The city has had periods of curfew and under section 144 of the Indian Criminal Code, processions and demonstrations are banned. A Goonda Act has been passed with powers to extern and imprison people responsible for riots.  
 
 
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