My friend Chad at CCK notes this story from the Chicago Tribune:
Emboldened by the anti-abortion movement's success in restricting access to abortion, an increasingly vocal group of Christian conservatives is arguing that it's time to mount a concerted attack on contraception.
Their voices were raised in Rosemont on Friday and Saturday at an unusual anti-abortion meeting that drew 250 people from around the nation to condemn artificial birth control. Experts at the gathering assailed contraception on the grounds that it devalues children, harms relationships between men and women, promotes sexual promiscuity and leads to falling birth rates, among social ills.
"Increasingly vocal" does not indicate influence or momentum, as the Trib concedes.
No one knows how many supporters Scheidler and his colleagues have, but conservative leaders are watching to see if the anti-contraception rhetoric gains traction.
Well, they aren't really, and it ain't gonna. The Catholic Church has long been opposed to contraception, but there has been no significant political opposition to contraception as such. The reason that there has been a pro-life political movement is that many Americans see abortion as a civil rights issue analogous to slavery or segregation. At stake is the constitutional status of a class of Americans (the unborn) who currently enjoy no protection. The Constitution controls American politics and it gives no purchase to those who oppose contraception that does not involve abortion. I realize that it is politically useful for Chad to imagine otherwise. But it's a red herring.
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