WASHINGTON, January 23, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) – LifeSiteNews.com participated in the US National March for Life in Washington yesterday. Speaking at the Rose dinner following the March, chief organizer Nellie Gray announced that the official estimate on participants was over 100,000. A bird’s eye view of the activities indicated that the great success of the march is largely due to the massive encouragement and participation of clergy, religious brothers and sisters and many of the nations’ top religious leaders.
The 31st annual March for Life began at noon with a rally in front of the White House. In addition to the address by President Bush given by phone, several Congressmen addressed the massive crowd including: Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) and Reps. Christopher H. Smith (R-N.J.), W. Todd Akin (R-Mo.), Todd Tiahart (R-Kan.), Steve Chabot (R-Ohio), Jim Ryun (R-Kan.), Melissa Hart (R-Pa.), Mike Pence (R-Ind.), Ron Lewis (R-N.Y.), Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.), Rick Renzi (R-Ariz.), Steve King (R-Iowa), Thaddeus G. McCotter (R-Mich.), Michael C. Burgess (R-Texas), and Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.).
Pro-life leaders from all 50 states as well as those from France, Italy, Poland, Ireland and Britain were in attendance at the march. Washington Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and some 20 bishops joined in the actual march to the Supreme Court building. The March for Life is known as the largest march in Washington but despite its size it is also famed for being the most peaceful, and for leaving the least mess.
Gray said, “We pledge support to stop this home-grown terrorism of individuals and governments participating in the intentional killing of an estimated 4,000 preborn children each day.”
The theme of the 31st annual March for Life was: Build Unity on the Life Principles. “We are calling for Americans to come together on goals and strategies to overturn Roe vs. Wade, by following the guidance of the Life Principles,” said Gray. “This means providing Constitutional protection for the unalienable right to life of each human in existence at fertilization. There is no justification for the state or any individual intentionally to kill an innocent born or preborn human in existence at fertilization. Murder is not a feminist/abortionist’s right of ‘privacy’”