Washington, DC – NARAL Pro-Choice America, the nation’s leading advocate of a woman’s right to choose and right to privacy, kicked-off the thirty-day countdown to the March for Women’s Lives this week. Pro-choice women and men joined together at hundreds of March Mobilization Parties stretching across the United States to prepare for this historic March on Washington, DC.

The nearly 300 parties were held from coast to coast, and everywhere in between; from Fargo, ND to Lafayette, LA; from Louisville, KY, to Reno, NV. Attendees gathered and watched a video created for the purpose of inspiring the activists to keep moving forward, as the day for which they have been preparing will soon arrive. They made posters proudly touting their pro-choice views to carry at the March, and talked about new and creative ways to recruit more people for what promises to be a gathering if unprecedented size. The mobilization parties were a means for pro-choice Americans to understand in a tangible way, that the March will soon be upon us, and all of the hard work and planning will surely lead to a successful event.

“It is truly invigorating to see the immense response across the country,” said Kate Michelman, President of NARAL Pro-Choice America. “Pro-choice Americans everywhere are waking-up to the reality that our right to personal privacy and our right to choose can be taken away, and they are ready to take action.”

The March for Women’s Lives will take place on Sunday, April 25, 2004 in Washington, DC. NARAL Pro-Choice America and coalition partners are spearheading the campaign to bring an unprecedented number of pro-choice Americans to Washington, to stand up for reproductive rights and to make it known that private medical decisions should be made between women and their doctors – not the government.

The need to March is clear: since 1995, states have enacted nearly 400 anti-choice measures. Attorney General John Ashcroft and the Department of Justice are pursuing an attempt to access private medical records, invalidating the protection of confidentiality in the doctor-patient relationship. President Bush continues to subvert the Constitutional duty of the Senate by appointing virulently anti-choice, anti-privacy judicial activists to the lower courts. And in 2003, for the first time since Roe v. Wade, the president signed into law a federal abortion ban.

As the recent release of Justice Blackmun’s papers reveals, Roe v. Wade hangs by a razor-thin margin in the U.S. Supreme Court. The possible retirement of two Justices could pave the way to the reversal of Roe, revoking a woman’s right to reproductive freedom.

Michelman continued, “Thousands of people who want to protect a woman’s right to choose joined together in living rooms from Syracuse to San Diego in a massive grassroots effort to build excitement for March in Washington, DC. And on April 25th, pro-choice Americans will show anti-choice policy makers on all levels of government – federal and state, legislative and judicial – that we will not sit idle as they restrict our rights - we will take action, and we will make our voices heard.”