Take Action Now! On Wednesday, April 18, 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court unraveled more than 30 years of legal precedent protecting women’s health and reproductive rights. Contact your U.S. Senators and Representatives and ask them to show their commitment to women’s health by supporting and co-sponsoring the Freedom of Choice Act.

Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a devastating blow to women’s health, reproductive rights, and the ability of all Americans to make private medical decisions. In a 5-4 ruling that placed politics above women’s health, the Court upheld the first federal law banning certain abortion methods. The ACLU and other groups had challenged this extreme measure because it endangered women’s health.

The decision is significant -- and dangerous -- in several respects. For the first time, there is now a federal law banning abortion methods. For the first time, the Court upheld an abortion restriction that lacks a health exception. The ruling thus undermines a core principle of Roe v. Wade that women’s health must remain paramount. And, for the first time, the Court declared that other interests -- including “the State’s interest in promoting respect for human life at all stages in the pregnancy” -- could trump a woman’s right to protect her own health.

The Court’s willingness to turn its back on women’s health and its own longstanding precedent is ominous. As Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg rightly explained in her stinging dissent, “[T]he Court deprives women of the right to make an autonomous choice, even at the expense of their safety.” At stake in this decision, Ginsburg adds, is a woman’s ability to determine her life’s course and participate equally in society. Notably, this is the first decision of the Court to address abortion since Justice O’Connor’s resignation.

Alarmingly, the decision invites politicians to pass additional abortion restrictions, regardless of their impact on women’s autonomy and health. Indeed, anti-choice extremists have already signaled their intentions. As Leslee Unruh, one of the architects of last year’s failed attempt to ban nearly all abortions in South Dakota, told the Los Angles Times, “I’m ecstatic. It’s like someone gave me $1 million and told me, Leslee, go shopping. We’re brainstorming, and we’re having fun.”

Clearly, the reproductive rights movement must be prepared to meet re-energized anti-choice forces on the ground and to fight back with every tool at our disposal -- from grassroots and legislative organizing to lawsuits and other legal remedies. With affiliates in every state and a team of nationally recognized reproductive rights lawyers and advocates, the ACLU is uniquely positioned to protect women’s health and equality. Immediately after last week's decision, we began working with physicians around the country to ensure that women continue to have access to safe and legal abortion care. We have joined forces with other reproductive rights groups to call upon Congress to pass the Freedom of Choice Act, a measure aimed at restoring a woman’s ability to make personal medical decisions free from government interference.

This blow to reproductive freedom has served to strengthen our resolve and commitment as advocates for women’s health and equality. We cannot and will not lose sight of what we know matters: women’s health and autonomy must remain paramount.

All of us at the ACLU promise to stand firm in defense of reproductive rights -- in the courts, in Congress and in every state across the nation. Please stand with us.