On March 26 the Reform Party endorsed the Canadian Conservative Reform Alliance (Canadian Alliance, or CA) by more than 90%. This overwhelming approval of the new party could revolutionize politics as it seeks to become the only mainstream party that is both economically and socially conservative. Of course, the main determinant of the direction of the CA will be its leader and thus far there are three declared candidates: former Reform leader Preston Manning, Alberta Treasurer Stockwell Day and Toronto lawyer Joe Peschisolido. Let's review for a moment the life and family positions of the leadership hopefuls.

Preston Manning: As leader of the opposition, Preston Manning has been a solid supporter of traditional family values and the protection of life. On many occasions he has spoken out publicly about his opposition to abortion and his desire for a public referendum on the issue. On March 30, Manning once again made his pitch for referenda on controversial moral issues. The March 31 National Post reports, "Mr. Manning argued the public must be given the power to protect itself from minority interest groups that may want to force their social views on the majority." Mr. Manning is pushing his refrerendum ideas again, which we have consistently rejected. Right and wrong is not determined by majority vote.

Stockwell Day: In various portfolios in Alberta, Mr. Day has been outstanding in defence of life and the family. His tax policies are family friendly, he opposes abortion funding and is reported to have argued for invoking the notwithstanding clause to over-ride the pro-gay Supreme Court Vriend decision. The eastern media has gone into an intense frenzy attempting to classify him as a right-wing bigot in the minds of Ontario voters. They successfully maligned Manning in a similar fashion some years past. The intensity of the attacks on Day appear to indicate that they consider him to be the most serious threat to their influence on the political realm.

Joe Peschisolido: Joe Peschisolido has run twice unsuccessfully for the Reform Party. In the first election, he was qualified by CLC as pro-life. In the second campaign, he was reported to have supported the Reform Party's referendum policy. He has since stated that he is a committed pro-life candidate.

In his March 17 address to the Liberal Party convention, Prime Minister Jean Chretien erased any doubt where his party stands on the taking of innocent life saying that "Canadians do not want a right-wing party in this country. They do not want a party that does not support women's right to choose." Of course, as always he leaves out what that choice is, namely taking the life of an innocent unborn child. The actions of Jean Chretien's government these past seven years have left no doubt where the Liberal Party stands on abortion but his most recent comments announce to the world that he believes support for pre-natal killing is a prerequisite for becoming prime minister. Finally he has more openly admitted what we have been saying for years but which many Liberal Party supporters have vehemently denied, despite massive evidence to the contrary.As many long-time Liberal supporters have remarked to us over the years, the Liberal Party isn't what it used to be, especially during these Chretien years.

For two weeks in early March, the Commission on the Status of Women hosted the final prepcom for the June Beijing +5 meeting (General Assembly Special Session, "Women 2000: Gender Equality, Development and Peace for the 21st Century"). CLC sent dozens of lobbyists to the prepcom to inform and educate representatives so that they would understand the radical agenda that the feminists were trying to push. The pro-abortion Center for Reproductive Law and Policy released a report that said the goal of the "radical right" organizations (including CLC) was to "undermine the Beijing Platform's consensus regarding (women's rights)." That is code for what they really object to: the fact that they were not allowed to ram their radical agenda through the meetings unopposed. And their dangerous anti-life, anti-family, feminist agenda called for a 35% quota of women in the military, easy contraception for minors, and lesbian and abortion rights including Canadian proposals to make abortion a human right and a call for abortion "rights" for young girls. For a meeting about the rights of women we found it strange that there wasn't a word on motherhood in the proposed document. To bring attention to this omission, some pro-family lobbyists sported red "Motherhood" buttons to counter the anti-family agenda of the meetings.

The feminists weren't happy that pro-life and pro-family NGOs were present to counter their propaganda and they took to underhanded tricks to stop us from getting our message out. Pro-life lobbyists were not allowed into some NGO meetings even though they were supposed to be open and at others they were not allowed to speak. The desperation of some feminists was best illustrated by their spreading a rumour that the red "Motherhood" buttons were a secret symbol in support of murdering abortionists.

The meetings concluded on March 17 and we are pleased to report that the Western nations and the feminist-led agenda they support utterly failed. The West's insistence to disregard national sovereignty and try to introduce "sexual orientation" and "sexual and reproductive rights" into the Beijing document resulted in deadlock. The G-77, a group of developing nations including predominantly Catholic South American nations and Muslim Middle Eastern and North Africa countries, buoyed by pro-life, pro-family lobbyists from the West (including ourselves) successfully fought the radical agenda. There will be an "intercessional" meeting in May to finish work on the document before the June General Assembly. Feminists might still be successful as cash-strapped delegations from the G-77 may not be able to send delegations to extra meetings. There is no end to the dirty tricks that Western nations and their feminist allies will stoop to, to get their agenda adopted at the expense of national sovereignty.

Once again, the Canadian delegation, with the strong blessing of the Chretien government, was ferociously leading the charge for abortion, gay rights and the removal of national sovereignty rights. When will Canadians finally wake up to the great danger of this corrupt abuse of power by the ruling Liberals?

A coalition of pro-life, pro-family organizations from more than 50 countries, representing Catholic, Protestant, Muslim and secular groups, are fighting to preserve the status of the Holy See at the United Nations. CLC was proud to play a key part in that coalition, bringing together over 150 Canadian groups that ultimately formed it. We are opposing the efforts of the anti-life, anti-Catholic forces such as Planned Parenthood and Catholics for Free Choice that are lobbying to downgrade the Vatican's status from Permanent Observer to Non-Governmental Organization, limiting its ability to affect policy. This all began when the International Planned Parenthood Federation brought forth a 300-name petition urging the demotion of the Holy See. (Sorry but you can't just stop recognizing the diplomatic rights of a country at the UN based on a petition.) These pro-abortion radicals are upset with the Holy See's opposition to their pro-abortion and anti-family agenda through meetings such as Beijing+5 at which Vatican representatives have had moderate success. The Catholic Church is "the number one defender of the unborn child's human rights around the world," Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family said pointing out the importance of having the Holy See present at the UN. "We Christians from all denominations will proudly stand with our Catholic allies to see that the abortion industry is not successful at silencing the Holy See at the U.N."

At this writing, Bill C-23, the federal government's legislation which will enshrine for same-sex partners the same privileges, rights and responsibilities as married couples, moves closer to becoming law. (The bill was passed April 11.) The bill, which affects 68 federal statutes, removes virtually any difference under the law between homosexual relationships and heterosexual marriages. It would give homosexual couples income-tax breaks and rights to pensions. In first and second reading, a handful of brave but principled Liberal MPs spoke out against the bill. In a transparent attempt to quell their concerns, Justice Minister Anne McLellan, the bill's sponsor, altered the legislation to protect the traditional definition of marriage. This is a stunning reversal considering that the March 1 National Post reported that Liberal MP John McKay asked the Justice Minister, "Is there any legal impediment to putting a definition of marriage in the bill?" to which McLellan said there was none, but that the definition of marriage was as relevant as a definition of "dog" or "cat." So why the sudden change of heart? McLellan's amendment would have marriage continue to be defined as "the lawful union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others." But this amendment still means that the bill would change the fundamental nature of marriage. The government wasn't even interested in hearing alternative opinions; it denied our request to address the issue in committee. Their message is clear: the country is going to see the traditional family marginalized, whether Canadians want this or not, whether it is right or it is wrong. And the elected Liberal politicians will be browbreaten to support it no matter what their consciences say or their constituents want. We would love to see a democratic revolt within the Liberal caucus with many MPs finally saying "enough! The good of the country must from now on come first".

On March 15, by a 32-15 vote, the Alberta Legislature passed the Marriage Amendment Act, a Private Members bill, defining marriage as exclusively the union between a man and a woman. Introduced by PC MLA Victor Doerksen, it pledges to use the provincial "notwithstanding clause" to protect the traditional definition of marriage in the event of court interference. CLC (and other pro-family groups such as the Canada Family Action Coalition and Focus on the Family Canada) applauds the welcome move of a legislature standing up for the traditional definition of the family and ready to defend it against activist courts. As FOF (Canada) President Darrel Reid said, "This law is especially important in light of Parliament's consideration of Bill C-23, which if passed, would strip marriage of any special status in Canadian society and opens the door to an eventual re-definition of marriage by our courts."

The February 29 National Post reported that they had to go to the Information and Privacy Commission following an Access to Information request to persuade Ontario's Ministry of Health to release abortion statistics. The ministry made the slanderous claim that releasing such numbers will contribute to "uncontrolled passion, be it expressed by a mob or by a lone individual who stalks and is willing to kill." Eighteen months after arguments and appeals, the ministry released the statistics. The public has a right to know how many abortions it pays for and the number of people who may be suffering because of the (deadly) mistake they've made. The Ministry of Health has since relented in its efforts to block the public's right to know and have released the figures. A total of 44,002 abortions were committed in Ontario in 1998.

As a result of the Post's initiative on April 7, StatsCan released the statistics that reported the number of abortions in Canada in 1995: 107 870; 1996: 111 659; 1997: 114 848. Campaign life Coalition immediately issued a media release stating, "We are appalled by the news that the number of abortions in Canada continue to rise. There is no future for this country if we fail to do something about this situation. It is our responsibility to call on Prime Minister Chretien to enact legislation to protect children in their mothers' wombs and to guarantee the future of our nation."

On February 25, Jim Pankiw (Ref, Saskatoon-Humboldt) moved for leave to introduce Bill C-440, an act to provide for a referendum to determine whether Canadians want medically unnecessary abortions to be insured services under the Canada Health Act and to amend the Referendum Act. He said, "The purpose of this enactment is to provide for a referendum to be held on the question of whether public funds should be used for medically unnecessary abortions." Public funding of abortion allows the government to take hard-earned money from pro-life citizens to be used for the murder of unborn children. Despite polls that show that a majority of Canadians oppose taxpayer funding of abortion, politicians are loathe to address this injustice. Mr. Pankiw's bill is still flawed: it leaves open what is "medically necessary" and there will certainly be enough loopholes as to effectively maintain the current funding regime. However, it would force the public to reconsider the issue and bring abortion back to the political table.

On March 20, CLC New Brunswick President Peter Ryan addressed the Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology: Subcommitee to Update "Of Life and Death," on the issue of withholding and withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment and its connection in some cases to nonvoluntary euthanasia. He said that we must beware of "undertreatment," namely "when a noncompetent patient is denied beneficial, nonburdensome treatment because of someone's prejudice with respect to the patient's disability, age, or illness." Ryan reports that the committee wasn't interested in hearing what CLC had to say and that it bunched us with four other pro-life speakers, perhaps indicating that the committee will be used to advance a pro- euthanasia agenda. The committee's final report could be used to support Senator Sharon Carstairs pro-euthanasia Bill S-2, which CLC has also asked to address. The one good thing that happened that day was that New Brunswick Senator Eymard Corbin went on record opposing the 1995 Euthanasia Report's recommendation in favour of a "compassionate homicide" crime category. As Ryan says, such a category would "softpeddle euthanasia and make it more socially acceptable."

On February 21, three University of British Columbia students filed a lawsuit against the university's Alma Mater Society (AMS), the UBC student government, and several individual students. The Plaintiffs, Stephanie Gray, Athena Macapagal and Michelle Laroya are all undergraduate students at UBC, and members of the Pro-Life groups "Students For Life" and the "AMS Lifeline Club". The suit stems from an incident on November 23, 1999, when they set up an informational display on abortion that was destroyed by several members of the Alma Mater Society. The attack was captured on videotape and broadcast nationally on televised newscasts. In the video, Erin Kaiser, the head of UBC Student's for Choice, along with several other pro-abortion activists, can be seen destroying signs and scattering the pro-life literature as they swept it off the tables before turning them upside-down. These Gestapo tactics were ignored by the university and, later, by the police. The pro-life students claim the University and the student government denied them their right to freedom of speech and assembly. The suit suggests the Defendants conspired against the students and their pro-life club by canceling and denying room bookings, and refusing to allow certain signs or even certain words to be displayed in the Student Union Building. Stephanie Gray explained to CLC National News that the AMS Lifeline Club, as a member of the Alma Mater Society, has a right to use the rooms. She says that the refusal is nothing less than an attempt to silence those who disagree with them. The students are seeking damages, as well as an injunction to prevent the AMS from continuing to stifle their speech on campus and have retained Craig Jones who gained national recognition for his fighting for the right to express himself during the APEC demonstrations in 1997.

The homosexual-rights movement has launched a campaign of hatred against radio talk show host Dr. Laura Schlessinger for her opposition to same-sex marriages. The campaign, which has included threats of violence, has lead the FBI to look into the matter. They concluded the security threat against Dr. Laura is real. Kraig T. Kitchin, CEO of Premiere Radio Network, which owns The Dr. Laura Program said "We have a legitimate fear for her life." The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) is among the many gay rights groups bullying Paramount Television in an attempt to stop production of her forthcoming show. The campaign against Dr. Laura has highlighted the usual tactics of intimidation and threats that gay activists have used for years to silence critics. Thankfully, Dr. Laura, an Orthodox Jew, has resisted the pressure.

We are about a month away from the March for Life on May 10 and 11 marking the 31st anniversary of the legalization of abortion in Canada. But we will not be there to dwell on the past but proclaim hope in a future that will embrace life. That's why the theme is Equal Rights for All Human Beings. Father Ted Colleton will be the featured speaker at the banquet and Heather Stilwell, chair of the Surrey School Board, a former leader of the Christian Heritage Party and President of Alliance for Life Canada, will be the feature speaker on the Hill. The Ottawa office has been busy co-ordinating with the schools in the region and we hope to have a large youth presence there. But we also look forward to seeing you. So if you haven't made plans yet, do so right now. For more information, call 1 (800) 730-5358. For those unable to join us for whatever reason, there is a way you can be there in spirit and support the March. This year we will be holding a candlelight vigil so we can witness together in a moving and powerful moment. You can be there symbolically by purchasing a candle which will be lit during the vigil in memory of the 2.3 million children who have been killed by abortion in Canada. Fill out the enclosed pledge sheet, so you, your family, neighbours and faith communities can be in Ottawa in spirit. Each candle is just $2.

Actor Michael Caine won an Oscar for supporting actor for his portrayal of an abortionist in the movie Cider House Rules and John Irving won a best screenplay adaption for the book that the movie is based on. Cider House Rules is a movie that even non-pro-lifers say is nothing more than a long pro-abortion rant. Irving accepted saying "I want to thank the Academy for this honour to do a film on the abortion subject. And to Miramax for having the courage to make this movie in the first place." The Hollywood elite in attendance cheered wildly. He also thanked "everyone at Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Rights League." Before the Oscars, Joan Rivers interviewed Irving and mentioned the pro-life demonstration at the event and suggested she would have opened the door and told them to go to hell. Funny how violence breeds violence. Nonetheless, the tens of millions who watched the popular broadcast were given pro-abortion, anti-life lectures from these Hollywood liberal elite.

Don't forget about the national pro-life conference in Toronto, October 26-28 featuring some of the most inspiring speakers of the prolife movement. We have already announced two of our speakers - Professor Peter Kreeft of Boston College and Professor Charles Rice of the Notre Dame Law School. But like last November's conference which people are still talking about, this one is heavily dependent upon your involvement. You won't just listen to speakers, you will play a central role in developing new strategies and tactics. That's why it is important for pro-lifers from across the country to attend the conference hosted by CLC Toronto and sponsored by CLC (Canada) and Alliance for Life (Ontario). We need your participation at the conference from October 26-28 (or come for whatever days you can make it) and then you can return to your local communities to help implement these new strategies. Once again it is at Toronto's Regal Constellation Hotel.

We would appreciate if you could send in your nominations for the Joseph P. Borowski Award, given annually by CLC to the politician who does the most to stand up for life and family. Get your nominations in soon so we can send out a ballot for all our supporters to vote. The award will be presented at the National Conference, October 26-28.

LifeSite Daily News is a service of Interim Publishing and it is absolutely free. When you subscribe, you get a brief synopsis of the daily news from a pro-life, pro-family angle by email. It takes stories from media around the world and corrects any factual errors, takes out the proabortion, anti-family spin and puts them in a brief one or two paragraph form for your convenience. The email service will also bring to your attention updates on the LifeSite website that features information on Campaign Life Coalition, the Interim, and pro-life, pro-family material. We are excited to announce a new feature, a daily commentary by Toronto Sun columnist and CTS talk-show host Michael Coren. Sign on at its website, http://www.lifesite.net. If you don't have email but know someone who does, tell them about this service.

Correction: The correct email for Paladin Labs reported about in the March CLC News is: info@paladin-lab.com

P.S. Please note our new address and phone and fax numbers. They are listed on the bottom of this page.

P.P.S. We are pleased to announce that after a confusing and disappointing 1998 Christmas cake fundraiser that we have rebounded a bit. Christmas cake sales in 1999 raised over $100,000 for CLC groups across the country. Thanks to each one of you who bought or sold cakes and contributed to this very important fundraiser. Yours for Life,
Jim Hughes
President, Campaign Life Coalition