BREAKING: U.S. March for Life founder Nellie Gray passes away | LifeSiteNews.com: "We thought we would have one march and that would be it. And before you know it, I was in charge of this March. And it’s not something that I wanted or anticipated, but we came together, we did it, and before we know it we had to do it a second time and one thing led to another.”
Also gone: Cosmo Editor Helen Gurley Brown Dies
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Showing posts with label History. Show all posts
Showing posts with label History. Show all posts
Get to Know: Horatio Robinson Storer, M.D. (1830-1922)
Horatio Robinson Storer, M.D. (1830-1922)Horatio Storer is an early American gynecologist. He is even better known for the "physicians' crusade against abortion" which he started and carried out with the assistance of the American Medical Association.
Most people today are surprised to learn that induced abortion was common among married Protestant women in the United States in the 1850s. The "physicians' crusade" led to the passage of laws in almost every state that protected the fetus from conception. These physicians, and the new abortion laws they worked to create, taught people that the fetus was alive prior to "quickening," the point in the pregnancy when movements of the fetus were first felt by the woman.
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Most people today are surprised to learn that induced abortion was common among married Protestant women in the United States in the 1850s. The "physicians' crusade" led to the passage of laws in almost every state that protected the fetus from conception. These physicians, and the new abortion laws they worked to create, taught people that the fetus was alive prior to "quickening," the point in the pregnancy when movements of the fetus were first felt by the woman.
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NARAL President Nancy Keenan to step down
Exclusive: NARAL President Nancy Keenan to step down - The Washington Post: At the end of this year, Nancy Keenan will step down from her post as president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, the country’s oldest abortion-rights advocacy group. The 60-year-old Keenan said she is leaving out of concern for the future of the pro-choice movement — and thinks she could be holding it back.
In recent years, Keenan has worried about an “intensity gap” on abortion rights among millennials, which the group considers to be the generation of Americans born between 1980 and 1991. While most young, antiabortion voters see abortion as a crucial political issue, NARAL’s own internal research does not find similar passion among abortion-rights supporters.
Related: Young pro-lifers vow to give up something they enjoy Until Abortion Ends
In recent years, Keenan has worried about an “intensity gap” on abortion rights among millennials, which the group considers to be the generation of Americans born between 1980 and 1991. While most young, antiabortion voters see abortion as a crucial political issue, NARAL’s own internal research does not find similar passion among abortion-rights supporters.
Related: Young pro-lifers vow to give up something they enjoy Until Abortion Ends
Bill Baird: Pioneer says birth control battle had a cost
Newsday: Decades of activism for birth control and abortion rights cost him a marriage, and the trust of most of his children, Baird said. It also left him with barely enough income to get by. The lecturer who once netted $3,000 a speech said he poured the money into court cases, and running clinics that gave abortions to poor women.
. . . Baird also claims some feminists and pro-abortion rights forces have tried to discredit him or downplay his contributions. "There were very few men who came out and championed the women's movement," Joyce Berkman, a history professor at University of Massachusetts Amherst, said last week. "And to have him champion their sexuality was suspicious."
. . . Baird also claims some feminists and pro-abortion rights forces have tried to discredit him or downplay his contributions. "There were very few men who came out and championed the women's movement," Joyce Berkman, a history professor at University of Massachusetts Amherst, said last week. "And to have him champion their sexuality was suspicious."
Related:
Bill Baird: A Genius at Getting Free Publicity (NRLC commentary)
Abortion-Rights' Scorned Prophet; Hated by Both Sides, Bill Baird Raises Hackles, Not Funds (1993 NYTimes article)
1956: "The Angel of Ashland" Kills New York Woman
RealChoice: 1956: "The Angel of Ashland" Kills New York Woman: On Saturday, December 8, 1956, 26-year-old Mary Davies of New York City arrived in the Ashland, Pennsylvania office of abortionist Dr. Robert Douglas Spencer (pictured). She was seeking an abortion.
As a physician, Spencer was typical of criminal abortionists. What was unusual about him was that rather than sneak the woman in through the back alley, Spencer plied his abortion trade openly.
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As a physician, Spencer was typical of criminal abortionists. What was unusual about him was that rather than sneak the woman in through the back alley, Spencer plied his abortion trade openly.
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Jack the Ripper: An abortionist too?
Jack the Ripper: Is this six-inch knife used by Victorian serial killer? - Telegraph: It is widely know that the person who carried out the killings would have had significant medical knowledge. His five victims had been expertly sliced open and some had been disemboweled. Two had their uterus's missing. Sir John Williams was an accomplished surgeon and routinely performed abortions on women. He held surgeries all over London at the time of the murders. A six-inch knife, matching the description of the wounds, has been identified as belonging to him.
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The real-life Vera Drakes not so saintly
The real-life Vera Drakes were not so saintly - Telegraph: The film Vera Drake was based on a study of imprisoned abortionists conducted from 1959 to 1962 that presented them as respectable women providing abortions out of the kindness of their hearts, who found themselves in prison as a result of their clients’ ingratitude. This picture was at odds with the evidence against them, and even with some of their own candid admissions. In fact, they did take money for their services, and their previous offences included larceny, prostitution, brothel-keeping, drunkenness and false pretenses.
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NAACP Denounces Pro-Life Billboards
NAACP Denounces Pro-Life Billboards Decrying Black Abortions | LifeNews.com: Hilary Shelton, director of the Washington bureau of the NAACP, condemned the 'Abortion Enslaves Us' billboards. “Comparing abortion to slavery certainly raises major concerns. Women are not forced to have abortions the way they were in servitude. Slavery was about not having the right to make any decisions. Women were actually bred to produce children for the purposes of profit. This is so far removed from that, that if it weren’t such a serious issue, it would almost be laughable.”
Newport Beach Abortion Clinic Is Eighth To Close This Month
Family Planning Associates, one the largest abortion clinic chains in California, has closed its Newport Beach office, Operation Rescue has confirmed. “This is an old abortion mill where pro-lifers have been sidewalk counseling and praying for decades. Its closure is an encouragement that we are winning,” said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman.
Family Planning Associates was founded by the notorious abortionist Edward Allred, who once claimed to have personally aborted at least 500,000 babies and famously stated during an interview with the San Diego Union that he wished he could set up a free abortion clinic in Mexico to “stem the tide” of illegal immigration.
Allred retired in 2005, and sold FPA, then operating 20 abortion sites in two states, to Irving “Bud” Feldkamp III. His son, I.M. Feldkamp, IV, continues to operate the chain. With the closing of the Newport Beach clinic, FPA now consists of 14 surgical abortion clinics and one that offers only the abortion pill.
This is the eighth surgical abortion clinic to close this month. That brings the number of surgical abortion clinics to 681 nationwide, down from nearly 2,200 abortion clinics in 1991. Operation Rescue maintains a listing of abortion clinics by state at the Project Daniel 5:25 web page.
Family Planning Associates was founded by the notorious abortionist Edward Allred, who once claimed to have personally aborted at least 500,000 babies and famously stated during an interview with the San Diego Union that he wished he could set up a free abortion clinic in Mexico to “stem the tide” of illegal immigration.
Allred retired in 2005, and sold FPA, then operating 20 abortion sites in two states, to Irving “Bud” Feldkamp III. His son, I.M. Feldkamp, IV, continues to operate the chain. With the closing of the Newport Beach clinic, FPA now consists of 14 surgical abortion clinics and one that offers only the abortion pill.
This is the eighth surgical abortion clinic to close this month. That brings the number of surgical abortion clinics to 681 nationwide, down from nearly 2,200 abortion clinics in 1991. Operation Rescue maintains a listing of abortion clinics by state at the Project Daniel 5:25 web page.
Ellen McCormack, Anti-Abortion Presidential Candidate, Dies at 84
Ellen McCormack, a self-described housewife and grandmother who ran for president as an anti-abortion candidate in 1976 and 1980, doing well enough to become the first woman to qualify as a candidate for federal financing and Secret Service protection, died on Sunday in Avon, Conn. She was 84.
Mrs. McCormack initially ran for the presidency to help focus national attention on abortion after the 1973 Supreme Courtdecision recognizing women’s right to the procedure. Her television commercials, partly paid for with federal campaign money, attacked abortion as the equivalent of murder.
In a 2007 column on the Web site Eagle Forum, Phyllis Schlafly, long a national leader in the fight against abortion, said Mrs. McCormack had played “a major role in the pro-life movement. Her leadership enabled the then-young pro-life movement to flex its muscles and demonstrate political courage, determination and perseverance.”
In 1976, Mrs. McCormack, who ran as a Democrat and campaigned almost solely on the abortion issue, raised a total of $525,580 in contributions of $250 or less from 20 states. That made her eligible for $247,220.37 in federal matching money for the primaries. The money went mainly for anti-abortion television commercials.
Her success prompted criticism that she had misused amendments to the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 that mandated matching money for presidential candidates. Critics said the amendments, adopted in 1974, were never meant to finance single-issue campaigns. Congress responded in March 1976 by requiring a candidate for a presidential nomination to receive more than 10 percent of the vote in two consecutive primaries to qualify for matching money.
Mrs. McCormack responded in 1980 by running as the presidential candidate of the Right to Life Party, qualifying for the ballot in Kentucky, New Jersey and New York and winning more than 32,000 votes. This time, she did not apply, nor was she eligible, for matching money.
In an interview with The New York Times in 1976, she said she saw slides of fetuses at the time and “was convinced it was a human life being taken.” Her political involvement started with her book discussion group and progressed to membership in the Pro-Life Action Committee. She never became a household name.
“We thought our legislators would take care of it,” she said of the abortion issue in an interview with The Times in 1978. “But they didn’t. We found very early that it’s in politics that the big decisions are made. So we decided to run our own candidates.”
Editor: A hero I'd never heard of. May her legacy live on.
Pearl S. Buck: Pro-life feminist
Today few people may recognize Pearl S. Buck as both a mother of eight and an independent public figure and leader among women, as a pro-life feminist. "Press steadily for human equality, not only for yourselves, but for all those groups who are not given equality,” she told Howard University students in her 1942 commencement address. Buck's tireless efforts as a champion for people in need extended to both women and their unborn children. Feminists for Life
The truth about "back alley" abortions
With the arrest of Dr. Kermit Gossnell and his associates for running an abortion “house of horrors” in Philadelphia, and legislative proposals to strip Planned Parenthood of government funding at the state and federal levels, abortion advocates are falling back on the claim that any effort to regulate the abortion industry will lead to the closing of clinics and a rise in dangerous “back alley” abortions. But these claims are based on myths. The truth is that legal abortion has increased, rather than prevented, the pain, suffering and exploitation of women. Elliot Institute
Part 8: How the politics of abortion protects bad clinics
The problems exposed in Florida's fight over abortion clinics—state neglect, pro-choice denial, and the relegation of abortion to the shadows of medicine—didn't end there. They have surfaced in other states, too.
On Sept. 2, 1989, two weeks before the Miami Herald exposé in Florida, the Boston Globe disclosed that Dr. Howard Silverman, the owner of Massachusetts' biggest chain of abortion clinics, had admitted to sexual misconduct with a female patient. . . . Like the exposed clinic operators in Florida, Silverman portrayed his unmasking as an attack on abortion rights. And, as in Florida, the Globe found that colleagues had known of his misconduct, as well as his generally bad reputation, but had kept it secret. . . .
A few days later, Chicago abortionist Arnold Bickham was arrested for practicing medicine less than a year after losing his license for gross malpractice. In the malpractice case, a woman had hemorrhaged and gone into shock after an abortion at Bickham's clinic. . . . No one could be sure how rare these offenses were, since abortion clinics in Illinois hadn't been regulated or inspected for four years, thanks to a court injunction like the one in Florida.
Another horror story surfaced in Maryland a week after the fight in Florida began. A woman lapsed into respiratory trouble while under anesthesia for an abortion at the Hillview Women's Medical Surgical Center. Despite having no anesthesiologist on hand, the clinic's medical director continued the operation. The patient went into cardiac arrest and died. . . . The clinic's owner, Barbara Lofton, blamed reports of her recklessness on the pro-life views of the local paramedic chief. He denied that he held such views. . . .
Over the years, similar cases have turned up in other states. Pennsylvania's Kermit Gosnell scandal may be the latest and biggest of these regulatory failures, but it isn't the only one. . . . For five months last year, New Jersey regulators received complaints that abortion doctor Steven Brigham, 54, was running a secret, cash-only, late-term abortion business using a risky interstate scheme—one for which he was disciplined in the 1990s. Just as in the Gosnell case, regulators took no public action against Brigham—until a police raid forced them to.
Brigham's case is still unfolding. . . . Despite the raid, a trail of botched abortions, and license suspensions in New York and New Jersey, Brigham is still operating clinics in New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. Last year, Pennsylvania's Department of Health, fresh from the gruesome discoveries at Gosnell's uninspected facility, approved Brigham's transfer of his clinics to his mother's company, thereby helping him evade an order that was supposed to bar him from owning abortion clinics in the state. The order forbidding clinic ownership "does not apply" to Brigham's mother's company, a health department spokeswoman told the Inquirer. And guess where Brigham has opened his latest franchise? Florida. Slate
On Sept. 2, 1989, two weeks before the Miami Herald exposé in Florida, the Boston Globe disclosed that Dr. Howard Silverman, the owner of Massachusetts' biggest chain of abortion clinics, had admitted to sexual misconduct with a female patient. . . . Like the exposed clinic operators in Florida, Silverman portrayed his unmasking as an attack on abortion rights. And, as in Florida, the Globe found that colleagues had known of his misconduct, as well as his generally bad reputation, but had kept it secret. . . .
A few days later, Chicago abortionist Arnold Bickham was arrested for practicing medicine less than a year after losing his license for gross malpractice. In the malpractice case, a woman had hemorrhaged and gone into shock after an abortion at Bickham's clinic. . . . No one could be sure how rare these offenses were, since abortion clinics in Illinois hadn't been regulated or inspected for four years, thanks to a court injunction like the one in Florida.
Another horror story surfaced in Maryland a week after the fight in Florida began. A woman lapsed into respiratory trouble while under anesthesia for an abortion at the Hillview Women's Medical Surgical Center. Despite having no anesthesiologist on hand, the clinic's medical director continued the operation. The patient went into cardiac arrest and died. . . . The clinic's owner, Barbara Lofton, blamed reports of her recklessness on the pro-life views of the local paramedic chief. He denied that he held such views. . . .
Over the years, similar cases have turned up in other states. Pennsylvania's Kermit Gosnell scandal may be the latest and biggest of these regulatory failures, but it isn't the only one. . . . For five months last year, New Jersey regulators received complaints that abortion doctor Steven Brigham, 54, was running a secret, cash-only, late-term abortion business using a risky interstate scheme—one for which he was disciplined in the 1990s. Just as in the Gosnell case, regulators took no public action against Brigham—until a police raid forced them to.
Brigham's case is still unfolding. . . . Despite the raid, a trail of botched abortions, and license suspensions in New York and New Jersey, Brigham is still operating clinics in New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. Last year, Pennsylvania's Department of Health, fresh from the gruesome discoveries at Gosnell's uninspected facility, approved Brigham's transfer of his clinics to his mother's company, thereby helping him evade an order that was supposed to bar him from owning abortion clinics in the state. The order forbidding clinic ownership "does not apply" to Brigham's mother's company, a health department spokeswoman told the Inquirer. And guess where Brigham has opened his latest franchise? Florida. Slate
Part 7: How the politics of abortion protects bad clinics
Grizzle [the pro-choice Florida state Senator] was mystified by the opposition. She feared for every woman in South Florida whoopened the Yellow Pages to find an abortion clinic. To her, the issue wasn't choice; it was safety. And hadn't the political war of the last year proved the dominance of the abortion rights lobby? She saw no need to be so defensive. But the clinic operators and their allies refused to take chances. "Once you compromise, they chip away at everything, and you're compromising women's lives," NOW's lobbyist argued.
Her opponents [the abortion lobby] said the state had "not presented one shred of evidence showing that any clinics are dangerous." In a terse order issued six weeks later, Gonzalez threw out the state's request. "What I think this means," said Carres, triumphantly, "is that nothing will be changed, ever." For the most part, she was right. It took Florida 15 years to enact new clinic regulations, and those regulations apply only after the first trimester. For 90 percent of the state's abortions, nothing has changed. Slate
Her opponents [the abortion lobby] said the state had "not presented one shred of evidence showing that any clinics are dangerous." In a terse order issued six weeks later, Gonzalez threw out the state's request. "What I think this means," said Carres, triumphantly, "is that nothing will be changed, ever." For the most part, she was right. It took Florida 15 years to enact new clinic regulations, and those regulations apply only after the first trimester. For 90 percent of the state's abortions, nothing has changed. Slate
Part 6: How the politics of abortion protects bad clinics
Sen. Mary Grizzle, a pro-choice Republican, sent a survey to every abortion clinic licensed by [Florida]. She requested a list of the clinic's active doctors and staff "to determine the numbers and types of health care professionals" involved in abortions. Many providers recoiled. For years, pro-life extremists had identified, tracked down, and harassed doctors who performed abortions. The providers feared that the lists would fall into the hands of those extremists. They protested and contacted the ACLU and Protectors of Women's Abortion Rights, an alliance of 34 Florida clinics. [The ACLU] advised them to withhold the names and [said Grizzle's office] would have to subpoena the lists to get them. . . .
Planned Parenthood's Florida affiliates referred several thousand women to abortion providers each year. If any of those providers screwed up, her organization could be sued. For that reason, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America regularly and thoroughly inspected any clinic or doctor's office that sought patient referrals for abortions. This responsibility made Planned Parenthood fairly tolerant of clinic regulation. How could it oppose standards less stringent than its own? . . .
Clinics frequently failed to disclose to Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services the names of all their doctors. Sometimes, on patient-treatment records, they concealed the names of the responsible physicians. HRS staff seldom, if ever, checked with Florida's Department of Professional Regulation to make sure that the doctors listed by the clinics were licensed. And although the best way to detect bad treatment was to review patient records, often the only records examined by inspectors were those selected by clinic staff. If a clinic had botched a few cases, the inspector would never find out. Slate
Planned Parenthood's Florida affiliates referred several thousand women to abortion providers each year. If any of those providers screwed up, her organization could be sued. For that reason, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America regularly and thoroughly inspected any clinic or doctor's office that sought patient referrals for abortions. This responsibility made Planned Parenthood fairly tolerant of clinic regulation. How could it oppose standards less stringent than its own? . . .
Clinics frequently failed to disclose to Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services the names of all their doctors. Sometimes, on patient-treatment records, they concealed the names of the responsible physicians. HRS staff seldom, if ever, checked with Florida's Department of Professional Regulation to make sure that the doctors listed by the clinics were licensed. And although the best way to detect bad treatment was to review patient records, often the only records examined by inspectors were those selected by clinic staff. If a clinic had botched a few cases, the inspector would never find out. Slate
Part 5: How the politics of abortion protects bad clinics
Pro-choice lawmakers in Florida insisted on treating abortion just like other medical procedures. Then they demanded exceptions. Then they complained that a new law to make that authority clear would be unconstitutional. They said Florida should wait for the U.S. Supreme Court to clarify which regulations were constitutional. And when a moderate pro-choice legislator proposed to spend public funds to help poor women offset the cost of new regulations the vice president of the Florida Abortion Council declined the offer.
One bill under consideration copied the standards of the National Abortion Federation almost verbatim. Despite this, [the FAC] refused to accept it. The proposed regulations were "too rigid." Either that, or they were "too vague." . . .
Perhaps abortion rights lobbyists could have killed the bill on their own. But the failure of clinic regulation in Florida, as in Pennsylvania, was a collaborative tragedy in which each camp played its part. Hours before the committee was to vote, Florida's top pro-life lobbyist told reporters that if any clinic safety bill reached the Senate floor, pro-lifers would amend it to restrict abortions generally. When Malchon heard about his threat, she was furious. The deal was off. Slate
One bill under consideration copied the standards of the National Abortion Federation almost verbatim. Despite this, [the FAC] refused to accept it. The proposed regulations were "too rigid." Either that, or they were "too vague." . . .
Perhaps abortion rights lobbyists could have killed the bill on their own. But the failure of clinic regulation in Florida, as in Pennsylvania, was a collaborative tragedy in which each camp played its part. Hours before the committee was to vote, Florida's top pro-life lobbyist told reporters that if any clinic safety bill reached the Senate floor, pro-lifers would amend it to restrict abortions generally. When Malchon heard about his threat, she was furious. The deal was off. Slate
Part 4: How the politics of abortion protects bad clinics
Unsafe abortion clinics exposed in Florida: What health inspectors and reporters found. - By William Saletan - Slate Magazine: Rather than help clean up, pro-choice leaders stonewalled. First they complained that the state Department of Professional Regulation was plotting to tighten licensing rules for abortions in doctors' offices. Then they claimed that by failing to crack down on doctors' offices as well as clinics, HRS proved it wasn't really concerned about health. Meanwhile, they cited HRS's regulatory failure as evidence that further regulations wouldn't help. 'If they can't enforce the laws that exist,' asked a state senator, 'why do they need stronger laws?'
Sensing defeat, Gov. Martinez gave up on his original regulatory plan. Instead, on the advice of HRS, he proposed milder sanitation, staffing, and equipment rules drawn from the National Abortion Federation standards—with which half of Florida's abortion clinics already complied—and from standards already imposed on birthing centers. Still, pro-choicers wouldn't budge.
Sensing defeat, Gov. Martinez gave up on his original regulatory plan. Instead, on the advice of HRS, he proposed milder sanitation, staffing, and equipment rules drawn from the National Abortion Federation standards—with which half of Florida's abortion clinics already complied—and from standards already imposed on birthing centers. Still, pro-choicers wouldn't budge.
Part 3: How the politics of abortion protects bad clinics
[The Miami Herald's] Sontag reported pro-choice leaders refused legislative remedies, insisting that current regulations sufficed. But Sontag pointed out that the sole regulatory hurdle, a license, required only a $35 fee and an inspection. She then discredited the inspection system with a single illustration:
When Ellen Williams died after an abortion at the Dadeland Family Planning Clinic, Dade Medical Examiner Joe Davis requested a special investigation. Investigators checked everything they could by law: The clinic indeed had copies of its doctors' licenses; patient records were kept; fetal remains were adequately disposed of. In other words, the clinic passed. . . .In Florida, such arguments about the futility of regulation had been made before, but in a different context: gun control. . . . Liberals dismissed these arguments in the context of gun control but parroted them when the debate shifted to abortion. And some abortion rights advocates went further. Recognizing parallels between the right to privacy and the right to bear arms, they explicitly sought to emulate the National Rifle Association. . . . "There are 70 million gun owners. But there are twice as many womb owners." . . . Surgical equipment didn't kill women; bad doctors killed women. No law aimed at clinics, their equipment, or their records would fix that. Slate
Part 2: How the politics of abortion protects bad clinics
Saletan writes of having "seen a story like the one in Philadelphia before." It happened two decades ago in Florida. The political stakes were higher, and none of the doctors involved was as bad as Gosnell. But much of what's documented in the Philadelphia report—unsanitary conditions, sloppy anesthesia, unlicensed practitioners, busted emergency equipment, lax record-keeping, and a patient's death—was found in the Florida clinics, too. And when legislators tried to step in, abortion rights advocates stopped them. . . .
The Florida Abortion Council, known as FLAC, included 18 of Florida's 48 providers. Thirteen of its members, along with seven other Florida clinics, belonged to NAF, the national clinic alliance. Both groups followed rigorous safety standards. NAF devoted three meetings each year to discussing medical precautions and innovations. FLAC held its own meetings on quality control. It was the only such statewide organization in the country, and its leaders were duly proud. Its members were mission clinics, and virtually all of Florida's independent feminist providers belonged to it.
Twenty-three clinics in Florida belonged neither to NAF nor to FLAC. Some had failed to meet the requisite standards. Others hadn't bothered to apply. . . . In south Florida, conscientious providers privately blacklisted the bad clinics and avoided referring women to them. Many referred patients only to NAF or FLAC members. But making this private rating system public seemed unthinkable. As little as the good providers trusted the bad ones, they trusted the government less. Nothing would make them break their silence. Not even a woman's death. Slate
The Florida Abortion Council, known as FLAC, included 18 of Florida's 48 providers. Thirteen of its members, along with seven other Florida clinics, belonged to NAF, the national clinic alliance. Both groups followed rigorous safety standards. NAF devoted three meetings each year to discussing medical precautions and innovations. FLAC held its own meetings on quality control. It was the only such statewide organization in the country, and its leaders were duly proud. Its members were mission clinics, and virtually all of Florida's independent feminist providers belonged to it.
Twenty-three clinics in Florida belonged neither to NAF nor to FLAC. Some had failed to meet the requisite standards. Others hadn't bothered to apply. . . . In south Florida, conscientious providers privately blacklisted the bad clinics and avoided referring women to them. Many referred patients only to NAF or FLAC members. But making this private rating system public seemed unthinkable. As little as the good providers trusted the bad ones, they trusted the government less. Nothing would make them break their silence. Not even a woman's death. Slate
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