Proposal 3: 'We're all going to be affected'

Oct. 10—TRAVERSE CITY — Approximately 200 men, women and children marched down Front Street, then gathered along Grandview Parkway on Saturday afternoon to support Proposal 3, the statewide ballot measure for women's reproductive health.

Lead organizer Monica Evans said the event was important for Northern Michigan because of women in the local community.

"I think that it matters in every community," Evans said. "I think that when we all stand together, especially as women, we become more powerful. The fact is, it's going to affect our sisters, our daughters, granddaughters, great-granddaughters, mothers, cousins, aunts.

"So, one way or another, we're all going to be affected."

The ballot states that Proposal 3 is "a proposal to amend the state constitution to establish new individual right to reproductive freedom, including right to make all decisions about pregnancy and abortion."

Its presence on the Nov. 8 ballot was triggered by the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June to overturn Roe v. Wade, the law that had made access to abortion a federal right.

Saturday's march was organized by the National Women's March of Traverse City Chapter.

According to that organization's website, they were one of more than 400 chapters holding events Saturday. A similar event, organized by the Petoskey Women's March Chapter, took place in Petoskey Saturday afternoon. (See story, Page 3A.)

Evans said planning for the march began approximately three months ago, when they first got the message from the National Women's March about the national "call to action" day.

She said she has helped plan events like Saturday's "too many times to count."

Their march was not met with any challenge from Proposal 3 opponents, but Evans and her team said they prepared prior to the event for the possibility of a counterprotest.

One of the ways they prepared for any backlash, she said, was to have "peacekeeper" volunteers in neon-green vests scattered throughout downtown Traverse City.

Rev. Alex Jensen, of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Grand Traverse, was one of those volunteers.

"I'm here to help try and show a presence of clergy that are here and trying to help keep this [event] peaceable, and to really support the right of conscience and the right of people to have access to reproductive care," he said as marchers were lining up.

Some women at the event, such as Karen Neilson and Kay Boyne, said they have been marching in support of abortion rights since before the original Roe v. Wade ruling in 1973.

Neilson, who works as a local election official, said that, in her opinion, democracy is at stake during this election cycle.

"I worked for the original Roe v. Wade, and here we are again," Neilson said at the march. "I thought we had this all settled off. It's crazy."

Boyne, who is 91, said she has been marching and organizing in the northern lower Michigan region since the first debates about the Equal Rights Amendment took place.

"I'm pretty sure it'll be my last march, after over 50 years of doing this," she said.

A self-described "feminist," Boyne said she helped start the NOW Chapter in Traverse City, and has lived in Benzie County for nearly 50 years.

Boyne said she also served as an Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) missionary in Chicago for a week, during the height of the ERA debates in the 1970s.

She shared that, in addition to organizing local events, she has "marched on Washington," four times, including once with the former First Lady of Michigan, Helen Miliken.

Boyne said in the past she has organized sister events in Benzie County to mobilize community members there when marches have been planned in Traverse City.

This time around, she said, she didn't get a chance to plan a Benzie event because of her health, but she drove to downtown Traverse City to walk alongside fellow protesters, wearing all white, just like suffragettes did in the early 20th century.

On Oct. 1, people gathered for an annual Life Chain anti-abortion peaceful protest along a three-mile stretch of East Front Street leading onto Grandview Parkway, according to a Record-Eagle report. Many held signs expressing their opposition to Proposal 3.

During that demonstration, Rev. Christopher Jarvis of Christ the King Catholic Church in Williamsburg said the impact of Proposal 3 would be "much more radical" than some voters realize.

According to reports, if it passes, it would add an amendment for "reproductive freedom" to the state constitution, invalidating the state's 1931 abortion ban. If it doesn't pass, abortion access would be up to elected officials and judges to decide.

Thus far, according to news reports, elected officials have suspended enforcement of the 1931 ban, and cases are being appealed to higher courts.