From the Chicago Tribune, today (read complete story on page 2):
2nd-generation activists take lead in abortion battle
Daughter of ex-governor and son of prominent abortion foe build reputations of their own
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On the surface, Cecile Richards and Eric Scheidler couldn’t be more polar opposites.
She’s the president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, which is trying to open one of its largest clinics in Aurora to provide women’s health services – including abortions. He is communications director of the Pro-Life Action League, which has vowed to do everything in its power to keep it shuttered.
Richards’ side won the latest round Monday as Aurora officials said the clinic would be allowed to open…. Foes said they will continue their legal fight against the clinic.
Lost in the intractable battle is that the two opponents are second-generation activists who learned at an early age not to back down from a fight….


www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-offspring_02oct02,1,6661641.story
chicagotribune.com
2nd-generation activists take lead in abortion battle
Daughter of ex-governor and son of prominent abortion foe build reputations of their own
By Bonnie Miller Rubin

October 2, 2007
On the surface, Cecile Richards and Eric Scheidler couldn’t be more polar opposites.
She’s the president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, which is trying to open one of its largest clinics in Aurora to provide women’s health services — including abortions. He is communications director of the Pro-Life Action League, which has vowed to do everything in its power to keep it shuttered.
Richards’ side won the latest round Monday as Aurora officials said the clinic would be allowed to open, after the Kane County state’s attorney’s office found no evidence of wrongdoing in the effort to get a permit for the facility. Foes said they will continue their legal fight against the clinic.
Lost in the intractable battle is that the two opponents are second-generation activists who learned at an early age not to back down from a fight.
Richards, 50, is a political organizer and the daughter of former Texas Gov. Ann Richards, a hero to the left who died in September 2006. Scheidler, 41, grew up on the Northwest Side, where his father, Joe, gave birth to the Pro-Life Action League in 1980. The elder Scheidler, still active in day-to-day operations, is the man whom conservative pundit Patrick Buchanan called “the Green Beret of the pro-life movement.”
Both see themselves as championing the rights of the underdog, and this handing down of fervently held beliefs, from parent to child, provides a human back story to the familiar rhetoric of a deeply divisive issue.
For Richards, with a die-hard Democratic mother and a civil rights attorney father, dissent is part of her DNA.
“What my folks taught me early was to stand up for what you think is right,” said Richards, who at age 12 was sent to the principal’s office for wearing an armband opposing the Vietnam War and at Brown University organized janitors who were pressing for better working conditions.
“My parents both had a strong sense of social justice … and as a liberal in Texas, you weren’t in the majority. But if you saw something that needed doing, well, you just rolled up your sleeves and did it.”
The mother of three — 16-year-old twins and a 20-year-old — now lives in New York, but the thick skin she acquired in Texas has served her well.
In early 2006, barely a month into the top job at Planned Parenthood, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to take up an abortion rights case, South Dakota became the first state to ban virtually all abortions, and her mother was diagnosed with esophageal cancer.
“It was the most exhilarating and saddest time of my life,” she recalled.
That South Dakota initiative was later rejected by voters, but her to-do list is never-ending. While she has not attended rallies in Aurora, she’s been in constant contact with local leaders and will visit the Aurora clinic next week, knowing she will be greeted by protesters. At almost 6 feet tall and a fiery stump speaker — at a benefit in Chicago this year she helped raise $350,000 — she can give as good as she gets.
“We’re only on this earth for a short time … and this job is a privilege. The opportunity to make a difference in the lives of so many people is unparalleled.”
Scheidler echoes similar sentiments — except the lives he is referring to are the unborn — the reason he has been working around the clock to thwart the opening of the 22,000-square-foot facility a mere 5 miles from the home he shares with his wife and eight children, ages 4 months to 15 years.
“Is this personal?” he asked. “Absolutely.”
Like Richards, Scheidler grew up in private schools (a third-generation graduate of Chicago’s St. Ignatius College Prep), engaging in lively debate around the dinner table, where Catholicism and politics merged seamlessly — not surprising given Joe Scheidler was a Benedictine seminarian who stopped just short of ordination.
Some of the son’s earliest memories are of picketing and protests after the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalized abortion nationwide in 1973.
“I was about 7 or 8 years old when my dad showed us a filmstrip about abortion on a screen in the basement. He was convinced that all you had to do was show what abortion does — that a fetus was really just a little baby — and that Roe v. Wade would be overturned.”
But Eric Scheidler never saw himself at the forefront of a movement. While Richards has spent her adult life as an activist, Eric Scheidler preferred academia, teaching English composition and literature to college students.
Besides, as the oldest of seven children, he felt his father’s crusade was too tough on the family, something he wouldn’t want to impose on his own brood.
“My dad was away a lot,” he said. “There were financial hardships too. … We never had as much money as anyone else. And then there was the fact that it brought a lot of controversy into our lives. In college, you always knew that when someone asked what your father did for a living, you could be in for an argument that would last a year. Sometimes, it was just easier to say that my dad ran a non-profit. It was just easier not to go there.”
Scheidler’s own epiphany started in 1998, after falling away and then returning to the Catholic Church. He became intrigued with a new organization, the Gift Foundation, focusing on sexuality and marriage — one that took on not just abortion, but also birth control. He quit teaching to join up.
Four years later, he jumped to the Pro-Life Action League, where his sister Amy is also employed.
While his title is communications director, Aurora has been his debut in the spotlight — and a sign his father, 80, is comfortable handing over the reins.
“I’m very proud. … In many ways, he has done this better than I could,” said Joe Scheidler, citing a 40-day prayer vigil opposing the clinic as an example of his son’s organizational skills. “It’s an affirmation that he has caught the whole issue of what is going on in our society and feels an urgency to remedy it.”
Richards, too, sees Aurora as a turning point — a wake-up call to passive supporters who can’t remember a time when abortion wasn’t safe and legal, she said.
“I think [the battle over the clinic] will be associated with increasingly desperate measures … and that these tactics will backfire.”
– – –
Their lives in–and away from–the debate
Cecile Richards
Religion: Methodist
Education: B.A., history, Brown University, 1980
What I’m reading: “Into Thin Air.” My kids and I just trekked to Machu Picchu.
How I relax: I love to bake pies. Lemon meringue and pecan are my best.
Most valuable lesson from my mom: Don’t let your fear keep you from taking chances.
Greatest political victory: Having my mother elected governor.
Eric Scheidler
Religion: Catholic
Education: B.A., English, University of Illinois, 1989; M.A., English, University of Georgia.
What I’m reading: “Lost Tales.” I’m a total Tolkien nerd.
How I relax: Cycling and I’ve been brewing my own beer for 15 years.
Most valuable lesson from my dad: Humility
Greatest political victory: Keeping the Planned Parenthood facility closed since Sept. 18.

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