Chapter 25
The Clergy Join the Fight
In every case, once the
formation of the chapter was announced in a newspaper and the phone numbers
given, they were deluged with calls, usually
between 30-75 within 24 hours.
Los Angeles received 293 calls in their first 24 hours.
If anyone
believes legislation will stop abortion, the Clergy Counseling Service’s
(CCS) work might make them think again. In the late 1960s and early 1970s
mostly Protestant clergy and rabbis all over the United States formed chapters
to help women seeking safe abortions
to find them. An estimated 500,000 women took advantage of their help. That is half a million women who broke the law and some 3,000 religious men participated in breaking
the law they felt was unjust.
The driving force behind CCS was Rev. Howard Moody of The Judson Memorial
Church in New York City. Located in Washington Square, the church looks
like any other brown-brick church. In May 2017 the church celebrated the 50th
year anniversary of the founding of the Clergy Counseling Service (CCS).
Celebrated is the correct word.
Moody knew he was facing
a possible $1,000 fine and a year in jail for his
work, but he said, “Some of us feel very strongly and I think we ought to
break the law.”
As part of the research in establishing the service, the
group talked to women who underwent illegal abortions to determine what they went through. They had a doctor show them
how an abortion worked using a medical model.
Twenty-one people met to form CCS. One of them was Lawrence
Lader (See Chapter 14). It was Lader, according to Bill Baird, who broke the story
to The New York Times before the group planned to announce it. The newspaper published it
under the heading: “Clergymen Offer Abortion Advice; 21 Ministers and Rabbis
Form New Group—Will Propose Alternatives.” The names of participants were
given.
The Early
Days
An answering machine had been set up at Judson
Memorial Church. The goal was to change
the message weekly, giving the names and phone numbers of two clergy
that women in trouble could contact. People who called did not leave messages.
It was up to the women whether to telephone or not. A
face-to-face meeting allowed the clergyman to decide how to best help the
woman, which included keeping the baby if she wished. For those that were
determined to have an abortion, they were given the name and coordinates of the doctor who would
do it. There was to be no pressure on the woman
to decide one way or the
other.
The first day
they received 35 calls: four were Catholic,
60% were Jewish.
Moody became the spokesman for the group. He was assisted
by Arlene Carmen, who was from a Jewish family. Carmen joined the project in
November 1967. She would provide much of the legwork in finding and maintaining a roster of licensed doctors,
who would provide the procedures under the right
conditions at reasonable prices. If any doctor fell outside the guidelines they
were removed from the roster. Carmen was the only person who had direct contact
with the doctors.
Although she was afraid to fly, to find qualified, sympathetic and qualified
doctors she flew all over: Canada, England, Mexico, Puerto Rico and the United States
Standards for doctors included:
A license
A medical facility, not a motel room
Humanitarian attitude
Used dilation and curettage
(with or without anesthetic)
Experience and limitations (Some doctors had limits on how pregnant
the woman was.)
So serious was CCS
about maintaining the quality of the service,
by 1973 when Roe v.
Wade was passed over 300 doctors were on the banned list for
not meeting CCS standards.
The woman needed
to bring some proof of the length
of her pregnancy. Some of their regular doctors refused to give it.
For legal protection for CCS, the women needed to go to another state for the abortion. The women were asked to report their experiences to help CCS maintain the quality and the need for
safety.
Carmen ran into some interesting problems.
The Mafia, who also operated
abortion services in New Jersey, offered
her $50 for every
woman sent to their New Jersey abortion service. She refused.
Moody and Carmen wrote a book: Abortion Counseling and Social Change,
from Illegal Act to Medical Practice: The story of the Clergy Consultation Service
on Abortion. Published in 1973, a few copies are available on Amazon (October 2017)
for prices starting at $500.
Expansion
Moody
found at first that other clergy didn’t know the difficulties women met when
faced with an unwanted pregnancy. He comparted it to how clergy in all-white communities didn’t see there was a race problem. He knew that
once the service was available, women would come.
He was right.
CCS received calls
from all over,
showing the need for more chapters. Some of the earliest states to sign on were:
New Jersey
Pennsylvania
California
By the time Roe
v. Wade was passed, 38 states had one or more chapters.
In every case, once the formation of the chapter was
announced in a newspaper and the phone numbers given,
they were deluged
with calls, usually
between 30-75 within
24 hours. Los Angeles received 293 calls in their
first 24 hours.
The New York office created
a National CCS which served as an information center. General Motors heir Stewart Mott
helped provide funding. Contributions came in from the women who had had the
abortions and could afford it.
Rev. Bennett Owens,
a Yale Divinity School graduate
and an administrator for the Episcopal Church, was given a year’s
leave to help CCS recruit new chapters.
Costs
and Travel
Between
travel to another country and the abortionist, an abortion could run up to
$7,000 ($46,869 in 2018 dollars) which meant it was more accessible to white upper-class women. Cost was not
always a blockage. Going to another state was less expensive. Some doctors
would provide their service for free to poor black women or at reduced costs.
Carmen monitored the charging closely
and did not hesitate to either strike off a doctor
charging too much or negotiate smaller fees.
Many of the women had never traveled
and needed help with airline
reservations, passports and visas.
A Clinic
Eventually CCS opened their own clinic
with Hale Harvey
as the doctor to provide care with the goals of being:
Low cost
High quality
Humane treatment
Some of the small touches
included colorful decorations, comfortable stirrups, cookies and sodas, and a non-hospital
atmosphere
Judson Memorial Church
had earlier offered
the first drug treatment service
in Greenwich Village. Later
they would offer help to AIDS patients.
Legal
Issues
CCS
fought the legislators who wanted to make a requirement that a woman must have
psychological or religious counseling first. Moody told the district attorney
who came to him, “No way.” A woman, he said, could always come to clergy
if they wanted, but to force her was
unacceptable.
In Michigan the clergy went to the state police
to help set ground rules. The police helped them avoid certain words. The
state attorney general and governor were involved. There was never a problem.
Chapters reported
that police often brought wives, daughters, girlfriends and sisters
to CCS for help.
In one case in Missouri
when the CCS member was called by a sheriff’s office, she thought arrest was eminent. What the caller wanted
was a referral.
Although CCS had an extremely low death rate, mainly
because doctors were struck off the list for the least infraction, there was a
referral from the Cleveland chapter to a clinic in England. Their investigation
showed that the girl had not had the procedure done by the recommended doctor
but another doctor.
Moody notified all CCS chapters
to safeguard that only
the recommended doctor should perform the abortion.
As of 1968, 44 states
had laws that clergy could not be forced to reveal what parishioners
had told them. Mullen v. United States in
1958 had earlier established that right.
In Cleveland a lawyer told the counselors not to write anything down and instead
have the woman write down the information given orally.
Another issue was if a clergy member counsels a person later accused of a crime, prosecuting the clergy member is a
threat to church freedom.
Rabbi
Max Ticktin was caught up in a police sting in Chicago. Earlier he had
counseled conscientious objectors to the Vietnam
war. On 23 December 1969, Ticktin was approached by a
couple. That the woman wanted to wait a week bothered him, but not enough not
to proceed.
During the counseling session, Ticktin said that he did not
advocate abortion but was there to explore
alternatives. He had lists of doctors in London and Puerto Rico.
He did mention a Detroit doctor.
Early the next year, when Ticktin was in Israel,
he was told that his office had been
raided. The couple who he’d counselled were a policeman and policewoman.
Tiktin was arrested on his return
to the U.S.
The charges
were dropped. The judge ruled that Michigan
law allowed abortion
when necessary to preserve life, and that was vague.
There were other “close calls” in Pennsylvania, Kansas,
Florida and New York.
Denominations and Gender
Although
Moody was a Baptist and many of the first clergy to join CCS were Baptists, that was
partially because of Moody’s connections. There were also Jewish rabbis
(61), usually reformed, but a few conservatives. The
small number of rabbis annoyed Arlene Carmen, who was Jewish. One of the things
that bothered her was that they only had one rabbi a month. Many of the women
who called asked for a rabbi.
Other denominations included:
Congregationalists
Church of the Brethren
Disciples of Christ
Episcopal
Friends
Lutherans
Methodist
Reformed Church
Swedenborgian
Unitarians
In the beginning
only men were CCS counselors. However, more women were being ordained in some of the churches and
some of them took on the role of CCS counselors.
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