Days until we Walk for Life on January 25, 2025
2014 Walk For Life West Coast banner
2014 Walk For Life West Coast banner

Tomorrow, Tues. January 28, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors will vote on the resolution introduced by Supervisor David Campos and six of his colleagues opposing our ‘Abortion Hurts Women’ banners.  We consider it a foregone conclusion that the resolution will pass, since a majority of the board has already endorsed it.

The Supervisors latest effort to make themselves ridiculous has earned them nationwide notice.   Even the San Francisco Chronicle–no friend of the Walk for Life West Coast–condemned the resolution in a January 24 editorial (someone told us KGO TV also had an editorial condemning the resolution, but we could not find the clip). Here’s an excerpt from the Chronicle’s op-ed:

City can’t suppress unpopular message

“From the Embarcadero to Civic Center Plaza, 50 banners proclaiming “Abortion hurts women” have waved for a month from city lamp posts in advance of the 10th annual Walk for Life rally Saturday.

 The banners have infuriated pro-choice advocates, who hung their own banners from the same utility poles two years ago in observance of the anniversary of the Supreme Court decision that enshrined a woman’s right to choose…

Supervisor Campos’ objections to the message likely reflect those of his constituents and many San Franciscans. Our position on abortion rights is well established: A woman’s right to choose is a matter of fundamental privacy that is protected by the U.S. Constitution.

However, this is not about whether we or anyone at City Hall likes the message on those antiabortion banners. If the city wants to keep contentious issues from those prime vantage points, it should be applied evenly. When it comes to the airing of views in public places, a government does not have the right to give an advantage to those it agrees with and to suppress those it does not.”

When a pro-abortion group demanded Mayor Ed Lee remove the banners, Mayor Lee’s spokesman Francis Tang responded “Mayor Lee is a staunch, longtime defender of a woman’s right to choose and disagrees strongly with the message of the banners, but the mayor’s disapproval obviously doesn’t and shouldn’t trump the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.”

Would that the Supervisors could understand such a simple principle of civic responsibility.

The Supervisors will meet tomorrow at City Hall, between Van Ness and Polk Streets, and Golden Gate and McAllister, in room 250.  Public comment is allowed, and could begin as early as 2:30, or as late as 3:30.  

Concerned San Franciscans should consider attending and making their voices heard.

 

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