Prometheus 6

Anti-Abortion Activists Worry That a New City Law Will Make Their Task Harder
By JULIE BOSMAN

About 80,000 abortions are done annually in New York City, according to state health statistics, but these days it is far from the center of the national abortion debate. The city is not known for abortion-related violence, and when an abortion provider is shot dead, as was Dr. George R. Tiller in Wichita, Kan., last Sunday, it can feel like it happened in another country.

But 36 years after Roe v. Wade, the abortion war goes on, even in a small way in New York, where next month, a new city law will take effect that could make it easier for anti-abortion demonstrators to be arrested if they restrict access to a clinic or harass people attempting to enter.

The law currently allows the police to make arrests only if the person directly affected — usually a woman entering a clinic for an abortion — is willing to press charges. The new law allows third parties, such as clinic workers, to press charges if they witness the activity.