Posted on 03/21/2002 3:29:22 AM PST by chemicalman
NOW president warns of conservative agenda
Alumna returns for Loyola speech
03/21/02 By Bruce Nolan
Kim Gandy, the former New Orleanian who heads the National Organization for Women, returned to her old law school Wednesday to warn of "ultra-conservative" judges' growing threat to a broad liberal agenda, while demonstrators protested her stand on abortion rights and claimed Loyola University had compromised its Catholic identity by inviting her. For 55 minutes, Gandy sketched a vision of conservative federal appellate courts quietly dismantling legislation protecting the environment, employee rights and workplace safety standards. The reversals are occurring in bits and pieces in complicated cases largely below media radar, she said. "I'm scared to death, and I can't figure out how to make this into a sound bite," she told a warmly receptive audience. Gandy mentioned abortion only briefly, warning that if the Bush administration gets three appointments to the Supreme Court, the 1973 abortion decision Roe v. Wade might be overturned. Her audience of about 250 filled a classroom at Loyola's School of Law after passing through beefed-up security. Bill Quigley, director of Loyola's Gillis Long Poverty Law Center, presented Gandy, a 1978 Loyola graduate, with an award for outstanding community service across a broad range of issues affecting women, the poor and minorities. Outside, a crowd of about 75 demonstrators carried large illustrations of aborted fetuses and preached against abortion. The protest was the climax of a storm that blew up suddenly and unexpectedly for Gandy and her hosts -- the law school, the university's Women's Resource Center, the Association of Women Law Students and the Long center. Her hosts said they invited Gandy to recognize an uncommonly successful law school graduate whose views on politics and the judiciary might be of interest to the legal community. Gandy said a local controversy was the last thing she expected when she accepted an invitation to return to her alma mater. "I'm very surprised. I speak at law schools and universities all over the country, at least half a dozen in the last month, and literally have never received a reception like this," she said. Loyola, however, is the first Catholic university she has addressed since assuming the NOW post last summer. As a young New Orleans lawyer, Gandy said she was mentored by local Catholic legal and political leaders including former Mayor Moon Landrieu, former Vatican Ambassador Lindy Boggs and Janet Riley, a former law school professor. "I have Lindy's autobiography in which she inscribed a wonderfully warm personal note to me," Gandy said. "In New Orleans, you almost cannot be an activist and not work with people with whom you disagree on this issue because it's a divisive one in this city," she said of abortion. "They thought I was wrong and I thought they were wrong. We agreed not to talk about it and find things we could work on together." But a rare public rebuke of Loyola from Archbishop Alfred Hughes on Friday galvanized local abortion opponents and elements of the Catholic community, some of whom said they regarded Gandy's invitation as only the latest sign that Loyola was adrift from its Catholic moorings. "Loyalty to the pope, not Loyola," read one sign outside the law school Wednesday night. "I'm one offended alumna & one sad mom," read another carried by Jamie Easley, a former high school teacher who said she earned a master's degree at Loyola in 1997. But many law students said they supported Gandy's appearance at Loyola for the opportunity to hear her views. Most said they did not think the school had compromised its Catholic identity in inviting her. "This is a place of higher education where people are supposed to come express their views so students can form their own opinions," third-year law student Katie Green said. "Just because she's here doesn't mean that Loyola's agreeing with everything she's saying." Bruce Nolan may be reached at bnolan@timespicayune.com or (504) 826-3344.
Staff writer/The Times-Picayune
Bill Quigley, director of Loyola's Gillis Long Poverty Law Center, presented Gandy, a 1978 Loyola graduate, with an award for outstanding community service across a broad range of issues affecting women, the poor and minorities.
BTW, she's lucky that alma maters can't get abortions that kill their "pre-graduate" students.
LOL!
LOL!! Threat to a threat is called a defense. She ought to kinow the difference, but then again, when you and your organization are made op of one or two issue activists whom them selves are totally irrelevant then there is not too much to worry about as far as I am concerned.
She ought to join CWFA and see what a real womans organization concerned with womens issues is all about.
the Left is peddling a fear-based agenda- and it has worked well for them in the past.The left is a fear-based agenda. That's why "objective journalists"--entertainers who hype bad news for their daily bread--and liberal politicians are interchangable parts. For that matter, the plaintiff bar is indistinguishable from either.
The main distintion among them is that journalists don't all have law degrees . . . but what do you bet that most journalists considered law before settling on J-school?
I find their use of the word 'illustration' reprehensible. That implies it is a made-up/created drawing, and not necessarily an accurate representation. I'll bet you money they were carrying large PHOTOGRAPHS of aborted babies, and this paper just won't acknowledge that they were real pictures of real murdered babies.
I also find their use of the word 'preached' somewhat annoying, if predictable.
Get used to it. Hopefully the silent majority has had enough and are not going to take it anymore.
They're odd?
If this were true, David Duke, Bin-Laden, and the head of the Illinois Nazi Party would have invitations everywhere.
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