Demonstrators hold pro-choice rally at Custer Monument in downtown Monroe
Several dozen pro-choice protestors raised signs under the hooves of the George Armstrong Custer Memorial in downtown Monroe Sunday afternoon to protest the potential reversal of Roe v. Wade.
Some drivers ignored the protestors, while others honked in support. A handful of people disagreed strongly enough with their message that they stopped briefly to argue.
Protestor and Monroe resident Allison Presson said she was disgusted, but not surprised when she learned of the leaked draft ruling.
"The fact that this keeps having to be an issue is pretty ridiculous," Presson said. “I identify as pro-choice because everyone’s body is their own business. Just because I myself decide to be a mother doesn’t mean that everyone else will. They might not have the money. Mental health is also sometimes an issue, because pregnancy is so very physically hard on you.
"It’s no one's business, really. Everyone should have (the ability to make) their own decision.”
Protests like Sunday's in Monroe have been commonplace across the country over the past week, ever since the unprecedented leak of a draft opinion from the U.S. Supreme Court that would overturn the 1973 ruling and leave the question of the legality of abortion in the hands of individual state governments.
The Supreme Court has vowed to investigate the leak.
“I was devastated at what our Supreme Court is trying to do to us women, and everyone in general," said Monroe Township resident Jennifer Judd, who was one of the protestors Sunday. "This has been the law of the land for decades and they are trying to overturn it and take our rights away. When you take one right away, you start taking more rights away from everybody. It is a trickle-down effect and we need to stop it here.
“I believe that everybody should have a choice," Judd continued. "It doesn’t mean that I want to go out and have an abortion tomorrow; but if my daughter needed to have one, and she wanted to have one, I want her to have the ability to make that choice for herself and nobody else to make that decision for her.”
This article originally appeared on The Monroe News: Pro-choice rally held at Custer memorial in downtown Monroe
