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Happy Friday #ChangeMakers!
I hope you are looking forward to a weekend that will bring you time for recreation, rest and time with family and friends. And I hope you are looking back at this past week as one that brought you a sense of accomplishment.
For my part, I had an opportunity to do a little celebrating this week, joining NARAL ProChoice Texas for an evening with Stephanie Toti to reflect on the journey that we’ve been on together these past few years, beginning with “The People’s Filibuster” from June of 2013 to the successful overturning of that law in the recent Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt case. You may recall Stephanie, highlighted in one of our earlier Deeds Digests as a #ChangeMaker, for her role in arguing the case at the trial level, the appellate level, and finally (successfully!) at the U.S. Supreme Court.
Pictured from left to right: Stephanie Toti, Alexa Garcia-Ditta (of NARAL) and me.
As part of the evening’s events, Stephanie and I had a chance to chat on-stage about our experiences in fighting for reproductive autonomy. As part of that, I asked Stephanie what her “young law student self” might have thought if she could have known that one day she would be standing before the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing one of the most important reproductive rights cases since Roe v. Wade. Stephanie recounted a story when she, as a young lawyer and brand new to the Center for Reproductive Rights, camped out overnight in order to hear oral arguments in Gonzalez v. Carhart (the case that examined the constitutionality of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act). She and other young lawyers endured pouring rain throughout the evening, their sleeping bags soaked, in order to make sure they’d have a seat in the courtroom. She recalled what it felt like the following morning, as she observed the attorneys arguing the case on behalf of women’s reproductive rights – how awed she was by it all and how she quietly dreamed that maybe one day, she too, could have the privilege of doing the same.
Stephanie’s “lucky break” came after many years of hard work at the Center, where she proved herself capable of representing our shared interests before the U.S. Supreme Court, realizing her dream and, by fighting for our reproductive autonomy, protecting the opportunity for other women to realize theirs as well. We are all the better for Stephanie’s efforts. Hers is an example of where our dreams can lead when we work hard to achieve them. I was inspired listening to her story. I hope you are too.
As Thomas Jefferson once famously said, “I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.” Let's all go make our luck, #ChangeMakers. I believe in you!
xo,
- Wendy
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