I just finished teaching an 8-week introductory course in American Federal Government on the campus of Ft. Sill for a nearby university. The majority of the students were active-duty Army taking the class over their lunch hour, with some from the regular campus population who liked the time. I did the same class in the summer. The students spent the last week of each class presenting Issue Papers and debating. Each student had chosen a topic of current policy interest and researched it. In their papers, 1 page max, each student presented a question concerning Federal Government policy, and gave his/her answer, a defense of the answer, and an action plan to work toward implementing that answer. The papers were then presented in class and debated.

In both classes several student chose something related to abortion. Though my sample is too small to have poly-sci validity, I offer some observations. Here is where it gets interesting for the politics of pro-choice versus pro-life:

1. Nearly all my students were pro-choice. Given that my classes probably were toward the more conservative end of the late-teens and twenty-something spectrum, the pro-choice movement may be making progress.

2. Interestingly, all the students who supported the availability of legal abortion thought there should be limits: they wanted new laws against late-term abortions and limits to the number of abortions one woman could have. Nobody argued for an absolute right to abort a baby. The pro-choice movement may be causing itself a problem by arguing for the absolute right to abortion without restrictions.

3. In one debate, some of the men argued that fathers should have a legal say in the decision to abort. The women in the class reacted emotionally against such an idea--a woman's body was her own to make decisions about. I think the pro-life movement would do well to make sure that the front-line in the fight against abortion is made up of women: men who picket abortion clinics probably are viewed by pro-choice women as just more men who want to control women.