In about 150 cities across the nation Sunday, pro-choice activists rallied against threats of women’s rights to have abortions.

The focus of the rallies was at the nation’s Capitol, where 150,000 – 200,000 people assembled under the direction of the National Organization for Women to “Mobilize for Women’s Rights.”

The crowd, “about 2,500 who were a mix of students and older people from the Chicago area,” joined several congressmen at the Lincoln Memorial for the few hours of speakers and entertainers, said Kim Villanueva, president of NOW’s Illinois Chapter.

NOW’s intention was “to tell the legislatures they have to listen to their constituents and their constituents are pro-choice,” Villanueva said.

“We wanted to make a statement to the courts, Congress and President Bush,” said NOW’s Campus Organizer Jennifer Radin. “We want to inform Bush that unless he switches his position on abortion, he will not be re-elected.”

“We are faced with a situation where abortion may be illegal,” Radin said. “And women might possibly die trying to abort (unwanted pregnancies).”

College students then would be directly affected since the majority of the abortions performed each year in the country are for women aged 18 to 24, Radin said.

“It is our issue, affecting us more than anyone else,” Radin said. “Men are also realizing it’s not just a woman’s issue. Their lovers, wives and sisters are involved.”

NOW’s concern stems from recent court attempts, such as the July decision on the Webster case, which are attempting to bring abortion “away from a federal constitutional right,” Radin said. The decision “paved the road for states to make abortion a state issue, which is discrimination,” Radin said.

Additionally, three upcoming court cases will contest this right.

An Illinois-based case will be heard before the U.S. Supreme Court Dec. 5 to decide whether abortion clinics should have the same standards as hospitals, Villanueva said.

agsdale vs. Turnock, if passed, would force women to seek unsafe measures, Radin said, since the price of an abortion would rise drastically from $250 to almost $900.

Attorney General Neil Hartigan, who has said he is pro-choice, is defending the state in this case, Villanueva said. The American Civil Liberties Union, on the other hand, is fighting these clinic regulations.

The two other upcoming cases might force “a woman underage to have the consent of both parents to have an abortion,” Radin said, noting this is “often impossible, if not absurd and harmful.”

Other local rallies included one at 201 S. Ashland in Chicago at the Church of the Epiphany, which “was packed, making the rally go onto the street,” said Julie Stege, faculty adviser for NIU’s Feminist Front.

The rally’s purpose was “to target Cook County hospitals for their poor health service, not only for abortion, but preventitive and maternity care, for poor, colored women.”

Rallies at Bloomington and Champaign saw about 150 and 75 people, Villanueva said. “Students have been energized” by the issue that greatly effects their era, she said.

“Students today aren’t waiting to see their friends die from botched abortions,” said NOW Mobilization Director Sheri O’Dell.