As the Feminist Majority Foundation, together with Planned Parenthood Federation of America and the National Abortion Federation, held a Washington, DC press conference in mid-January to refute the recent spate of articles claiming that anti-abortion violence is no longer a problem, two bombs exploded at the Atlantic Northside Family Planning Services in Atlanta, GA. The first one went off inside the building, injuring no one. The second, which detonated an hour later outside the building near a dumpster, injured seven people. The bombing was especially serious in that the second bomb was clearly planned to injure or kill bystanders and law enforcement, rather than simply destroy the building.

The Feminist Majority Foundation's newly released 1996 clinic violence survey revealed that 27.6% of clinics experienced severe anti-abortion violence in the first seven months of 1996. Severe violence includes death threats, stalking, bombings and bomb threats, arsons and arson threats, blockades, invasions and chemical attacks. When gunfire, home picketing, and vandalism were added to the violence variables the percentage of clinics and offices experiencing some form of violence or harassment rose to 44.9%.

"It serves no one's interest to allow pro-choice activists, clinics, and the media to be lulled into a sense of false security," said Feminist Majority Foundation President Eleanor Smeal in regards to the attitude that anti-abortion violence is subsiding and no longer important.

In a statement issued immediately after the bombing, President Clinton called the attack "vile and malevolent," and said that "[a]nyone who brings violence against a woman trying to exercise her constitutional rights is committing an act of terror."

Weeks later law enforcement received a letter purportedly from an anti-abortion terrorist group that calls itself the Army of God, claiming responsibility for both the clinic bombing and a later bombing of a lesbian bar. In the letter the Army of God, which has been linked to severe acts of anti-abortion violence in the past, threatens to continue terrorizing abortion clinics and gay and lesbian facilities.

In late December, 1996 a physician in New Orleans was brutally stabbed 15 times by an assailant who then traveled to a Baton Rouge clinic where he was found lying in wait for a second physician. Fortunately, because of the vigilance of pro-choice advocates in New Orleans, this man is now behind bars and is being charged with attempted murder.

A Tulsa, OK clinic, Reproductive Services, was bombed twice in January, and on February 2 someone broke into the building and shot up office and medical equipment. No one was hurt in any of the attacks. On February 6 Federal agents arrested a 15-year-old boy and charged him with involvement in all three acts.

A key finding in the 1996 clinic violence survey was that the quality of law enforcement response is directly related to the amount of violence and harassment clinics experience. Only 5.6% of clinics reporting "excellent" local law enforcement experienced high levels of violence, compared with 33.3% of clinics that reported "poor" local law enforcement response. Of those describing state law enforcement response as "poor," 40% reported high levels of violence, while only 4.8% of clinics who said state response was "excellent" faced high levels of violence. Twenty-five percent of clinics that said federal response was "poor" experienced high levels of violence; only 3.8% of clinics that characterized federal law enforcement response as "excellent" reported high violence levels.

In addition to strong law enforcement response, the Feminist Majority Foundation survey found that legal measures are a significant deterrent to anti-abortion violence and harassment. Clinics with "buffer zones" which kept anti-abortion harassers away from the clinic reported larger decreases in every type of violence than did clinics without buffer zones. The greatest differences were found in the percentages of clinics that reported decreases in death threats (23.2% of clinics with buffer zones reported a decrease, as opposed to 10.4% of clinics without buffer zones), invasions (21.2% compared with 6.1%) and blockades (23.2% of those with buffer zones reported decreases as opposed to 15.4% of those without). These types of "buffer zone" areas around clinics were upheld by the Supreme Court in a recent decision, although "floating buffer zones" around individual people approaching and leaving a clinic were struck down.

Clinics surveyed expressed strong interest in making the medical method of early abortion available to their patients: 69.9% of clinics said they were interested in providing mifepristone (formerly RU-486) at their facility. Methotrexate is clearly the second choice for clinics as a method of medical abortion: 54.2% said they were interested in providing methotrexate.

The survey, which covered violence committed during the first seven months of 1996, was completed by 312 clinics, including facilities in 45 states and the District of Columbia. Ninety-five percent of these clinics offer a full range of gynecological and other health services in addition to abortion.

Read the full Clinic Violence Survey report.

Learn more about abortion clinic violence around the country.