Right to Life Fights for Right to Protest

When The Champlain Valled Right to Life Group was denied five parking spaces in front of Planned Parenthood, they decided not to give up

Story by Andrew Beam

Several elderly members of the Champlain Right to Life Group are gathered on each sides of the sidewalk, five people on each side face the sidewalk as they chant the Rosary in front of the Northern Adirondack Planned Parenthood. One woman walks in between the two rows of protestors; she shakes her head in disgust after passing through, while one of them politely says "Good morning" to her.

Bart Gaffney, an older gentleman dressed in all black, with combed over hair which is sprinkled with gray, towers over the sidewalk with an intense look on his face as he leads the prayer. Though some may view him as intimidating, his wife, Wanda, says most people refer to him as, "The Gentle Giant." She notes, other than his size, what can be intimidating when he has "an edge in his voice."

In 1993, Wanda says, Planned Parenthood applied to expand the clinic to perform procedures such as colposcopies, an examination that checks for cervical cancer, HPV, or dysplasia. Later, Planned Parenthood said they would perform abortions, which led to Bart and Wanda doing the Rosary outside of Planned Parenthood in 1994. Every Good Friday since 1994, the Right to Life Group had performed the 13 Stations of the Cross, a prayer done in honor of Jesus' crucifixion, outside of Planned Parenthood. The city had always granted them five parking spaces where Police horses were set around them.

Things went a little bit differently this year. At a Plattsburgh City Hall meeting on February 28, for the first time in the thirteen year history of the Right to Life event, they were denied those parking spaces.

"There have never been any problems," says Wanda. "Never any safety problems, no problems with any people in the streets."

Bart assumed that someone had complained this time around. In the meeting, the motion to grant those parking spaces to the group was shot down with a 4-2 vote.

"I was leaning pretty strongly toward not approving," said Mike Kelly, councilor of Ward 2. "During the meeting, I became 100 percent sure." Kelly says he had heard tales that patients felt intimidated by those performing the prayer service as the patients walked into the building.

"There were seventy-five escorts there to protect the patients from them [Right to Life]," Kelly says. The escorts are there to help patients walk from their cars to the building of Planned Parenthood, since the protestors sometimes push their boundaries. "I've heard numerous tales where they leave the sidewalk and go onto the property," Kelly says. Bart interprets the purpose of these escorts in a completely different matter.

"I've heard numerous tales where they leave the sidewalk and go onto the property."

"If they have an escort there, that means the escort is going to take that woman and escort her to what?" Bart asks, even he knows the answer. "To kill a baby. Is it wrong to call them a Deathscort?" Deathscort, which is written on a sign Bart holds during the prayer service, is another thing Kelly feels makes the situation worse. Bart does have other signs where there are picture of babies with their heads cut off, which Bart says, "They are basically doing."

The issue that bothered most of the Council was the issue of safety and parking. What bothered Kelly most was the issue of Church and State. "It's unconstitutional. [The Council] has taken a vow to separate Church and State," Kelly says. "If they wanted to hold a protest at the Church I might pray with them. With that, they wouldn't be using City Property."

"People ask 'why not pray at home, why not at the church,'" Bart says. "They're killing babies right here in Plattsburgh and people don't know how many, possibly 500 a year." He then compares the number of babies killed in abortions nationally, his number are 5,000 a week, to the number of soldiers killed in the Iraq War. "Where's the moral outrage over that," he says, rattling off statistics. "That's why were out here [Planned Parenthood]. that's where they're doing the killings. Not at church, not at home, not somewhere else."

The inclusion of the Church, though, was not purely a religious reason. When Bart and Wanda began performing the Stations of the Cross, they knew they would not be able to fund $1 million worth of liability insurance for the City of Plattsburgh, which then denied them permission to use the street. "We made an alliance some of the churches and they said, 'yes,' and that they were, 'willing to participate,'" Bart says, "and the diocese provided the liability coverage for the City of Plattsburgh."

"This business of Church and State," says Wanda, "it's a catch-all for when they don't want you to do something."

"I really feel like there's no effort to understand the reality of a young woman coming in for her first exam or a woman in her thirties who's coming in for her first abortion."

Wanda mentioned that whenBart and she were in Philadelphia last week, they had seen the stone with the First Amendment written on it and 'The Government shall not establish any religion.' "That's what it really says," explains Wanda.

Wanda describes their event as very peaceful.

"All these people are complaining. Who's that guy in the middle, the council member?" Bart asks Wanda.

"I don't remember their names," Wanda replies.

"He came out and talked to us after the meeting…"

"He said we're harassing people," Wanda interjects.

"We don't harass people," Bart softly explains.

Gaffney and his wife seemed very confused by these statements. When asked what he thinks the council members mean by harassment, he responds, "I don't know, I say good morning to them with a smile on my face. If that's harassment, then ok, that's harassment then."

"If they think abortion is so wonderful, why would they be intimidated when we're out there praying for them," asks Bart. "If abortion is supposed to be a cure-all, why would they feel intimidated?"

"I think the big issue is a matter of perception," Martha Stahl, director of external affairs at the Northern Adirondack Planned Parenthood, says of what she describes as more than 150 protestors. "While these are not the type of picketers that scream and yell, though we've had those in the past or being very aggressive, their presence alone is very intimidating to people who might be coming in for services—especially for young people or people in a vulnerable position."

Kelly and Stahl both point out that the majority of the people protesting out in front of the building are older gentlemen, who Stahl says, "I'm not really sure they can relate to how it is for a young person to go in for their first gynecological exam."

"People have a right to have whatever opinion they want, and they have a right to express that opinion," Stahl says. "I certainly don't say that because they're men they don't have a right to express that opinion, but I really feel like there's no effort to understand the reality of a young woman coming in for her first exam or a woman in her 30's who's coming in for her first abortion.

"They certainly want to impose what their idea of what is right and what is wrong is, and there is no understanding that it might be different for someone else than it is for the protestors."

The issue was brought up again to a City Hall Meeting by the Right to Life Group on March 13. This surprised Kelly and some of the other council members. "I thought it was a dead issue when we voted no," Kelly says, as if in somewhat a shock, "But Bart didn't think so." When the vote came, it was a 3-3 tie after council member Tim Carpenter had changed his mind since the last vote. Mayor Donald Kasprzak had to give a tie-breaking vote. He voted in favor of the Right to Life Group.

"It broke my heart," Kelly says with disappointment. "I thought Plattsburgh would do the right thing."

Even with his broken spirit, Kelly has sworn that he won't back down on this issue, especially when it comes to vote on it next year. "I'll vote the same way next year," he strongly explains, "you can count on that."

How would you have dealt with this situation?