ll never forget the day that my attorney, pro-life legal champion Tom Brejcha, told me this:
“You gotta be able to take a punch.”
I had just lost a major court decision, and if it stuck, I’d have been on the hook to pay Planned Parenthood nearly $500,000 in legal fees.
We ultimately won that case, and I never paid Planned Parenthood a dime. And in the end, that bad ruling actually helped us win the case on appeal.
I’ve been thinking about Tom’s comment today, when the entire pro-life movement is reeling from the beating we took yesterday on Issue 1 in Ohio. One of our most pro-life states has turned pro-abortion.
But that’s not the end of the story.
Pro-lifers in Ohio aren’t giving up. They aren’t going away. They’re not going to forget about babies threatened with abortion in Ohio.
And neither are you and I.
Our opponents have made the most of the backlash against the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade. They’ve seized this moment. But this moment won’t last forever.
And we will survive this — if only we can take a punch.
Every victory we have ever won — from the 49-year battle to overturn Roe to a baby saved from abortion by a sidewalk counselors this morning — has only come about because we never give up.
It may take 50 years to root abortion out of the constitution of Ohio, where Ohio voters just enshrined it. Or it may take much less time than that, once Ohio voters realize how they’ve been lied to.
But either way, we won’t give up.
Pro-life activists in Ohio will keep going out to abortion facilities to offer women help. They’ll keep making the case against abortion to their friends and neighbors. They’ll keep up the fight!
And not just pro-lifers in Ohio, but all of us, everywhere.
My dad Joe was 45 when Roe v. Wade was decided. He died at 93, nearly 18 months before Roe was overturned. He didn’t live to see that day. You and I may not live to see yesterday’s defeat in Ohio reversed.
But we can be completely confident that — long after we’re gone — faithful pro-lifers will be fighting for that day.
Because we’re survivors.
Because we can take a punch.
