WASHINGTON -- Representatives of three anti-abortion groups met with a top
Justice Department official Tuesday to decry the slayings of abortion clinic
doctors.
The meeting marked the first time that members of Operation Rescue, one of
three anti-abortion groups present, have met with an official in any
presidential Administration, said Justice Department spokesman, John Russell.
Operation Rescue is one of the nation's most militant anti-abortion groups.
The 45-minute session with Assistant Atty. Gen. Jo Ann Harris who heads the
criminal division of the Justice Department, came less than two weeks after Paul
Hill, 40, was found guilty of the July 29 killing of an abortion clinic doctor
and his volunteer escort in Pensacola Florida was convicted of violating the
Freedom Of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a federal statute prohibiting anyone
from harming or interfering with providers of legal abortions.
Russell said the meeting was prompted by Operation Rescue's wish to have the
Justice Department give equal time to both sides in the abortion debate. Harris
and Atty. Gen. Janet Reno had met with abortion rights activists after the
killing.
Carl Stem, the Justice Department director of public affairs, said that the
meeting was "amicable" and "very constructive."
The anti-abortion groups, in addition to condemning the slayings, expressed
concern that the now federal act is scaring peaceful protesters into avoiding
clinics and that federal efforts to crack down are infringing on First Amendment
guarantees of free speech.
"Things people don't agree with do not lose status under the First
Amendment," the Rev. Frank Pavone of Priests for Life said at a street corner
press conferences after the meeting.
"She [Harris] said she is as concerned about infringements of the First
Amendment as she is concerned about violence," he said.
However, the representatives failed to persuade Harris to specify the types
of protest that he considers legal under the federal statute. Stern said that
Harris told the group. "I don't teach a law school class. I'm not one to [delve]
into the hypothetical."
Joining Pavone at the meeting were Flip Benham, director of Operation Rescue
National, and the Rev. Pat Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition.
The three voiced concern in the meeting that the Clinton Administration is,
assigning more importance to crimes against women seeking abortions than to
those protesting abortion.
Mahoney referred to an incident Oct. 6 in which an abortion protester was
fired upon outside the Baton Rouge Delta Woman's Clinic in Louisiana. The
protester was not injured.
Mahoney criticized the department for dispatching U.S. marshals to provide
security at more than a dozen abortion facilities around the country after
murders but not taking such action to protect protestors after the Baton Rouge
incident.
Mahoney said Harris assigned a member of her department to be contacted in
cases where anti-abortion rights have been violated.
Hill is to be tried in January on Florida state murder charges and could
receive the death penalty in the shotgun killings of Dr. John Bayard Britton,
69, and his escort, James H. Barrett, 74.
