I picked up Anne Potje in Union City on a cool day in October. We met Bob Powers in Oakland for our first school of the day, FREMONT HIGH which is about 98% black. It was lunch time, and dozens of teenagers came out the large corner entrance to the school, going off in four or five different directions. We were rudely interrupted by an older black man who, apparently, had an ax to grind. He was convinced that we were just distributing literature to black people, thereby showing prejudice. He started screaming at Anne at the top of his voice. Anne’s soft-spoken tones were no match for his powerful baritone vocal cords. Finally, one of the security guards told him to stop, and he made his way to his car yelling along the way and even kept it up when he was behind the wheel and passing by. I told the students that this man didn’t know what he was talking about when he said "YOU PEOPLE DON’T GO TO PIEDMONT " (the all-white wealthy section of Oakland). Obviously, the kids didn’t believe him as he only stopped a few from taking our literature.

     Our next school was LANEY COLLEGE close to Lake Merritt in Oakland. We began to leaflet the main parking lot. Bob started at one end and Anne and I at the other. It was Bob’s idea to separate so that one of us could continue if Security stopped us. Anne soon spotted a security car parked at our end. It was around 1:00 PM, so we figured he might be parked there having a late lunch. We moved up a couple of rows so we were out of his sight. As I kept proceeding in one direction, I noticed Anne and Bob had left the parking lot. Anne was reaching the foot traffic, and Bob leafleted the long row of cars parked along the street. I found out later that they were “hiding” from the same security car that had been parked in the parking lot. We managed to leaflet the entire parking lot - about 700 to 800 cars.

     After stopping for lunch, we headed back to FRICK JR HIGH just a few miles away from the high school. Again, there were lots of black students coming out of the school, and there was no opposition from the teachers. One 12-year-old boy refused the literature because he said, "DON’T WASTE IT ON ME. I’VE SEEN IT ALREADY!"" When I asked him where he saw it, he said, "YOU GAVE IT TO MY SISTER LAST YEAR. I’VE SEEN IT," he said again. "THEY PUT THOSE BABIES IN BUCKETS!!" (referring to ABORTED BABY DISCARDED IN HOSPITAL BUCKET picture.)

It was a cool, slightly cloudy day when we visited the rural area of Lodi. The first school on our list was a continuation school at which only a small amount of students were in attendance. (These continuation kids really need our message as they are the wayward students-kids on dope, pregnant girls, etc.) One of the teachers standing on the sidewalk keeping an eye on the departing students asked me to see our packet. He said nothing as he finished glancing through it so no explanation of our right to be there was expressed.

     LODI HIGH, a few miles away, was the extreme opposite in numbers. The whole area in front of the school-several hundred feet-was alive with students, most of them lined up for the four or five busses parked along the front sidewalk. Four of us-Adeline, Lydia, Mona and I-began to make our way through the lines, passing out literature as we went. The school principal - tall, lanky and young looking - came out to try to scare us off as he told Adeline that the sidewalk was "school property." Adeline quickly set him straight and told him to contact me to read the California Attorney General statement on our rights to distribute literature. The principal approached me asking to see the paper and then read through it as I continued to pass out literature. When he was through reading, he handed it back to me without comment and walked back into the school. Most of the students were very receptive, even walking up to us and asking for additional packets. Several of the kids who had boarded the busses without our literature called out to us asking for the material from the bus windows. A boy about sixteen standing in line refused the literature. "ARE YOU FOR ABORTION?" I asked. He told me that it was his business.

     The last school of our day was WOODBRIDGE SENIOR ELEMENTARY. The following is an account of our first visit there: We really enjoyed these kids - Gloria, Lydia and I. There was a definite difference between rural Lodi and the city schools. The boys and girls seemed to enjoy our being there too. They were asking questions about the literature and making comments. One boy (I could tell he was the class clown) said his mother had decided to abort him but didn’t go through with it. I wasn’t sure whether or not he was telling the truth. He made a comment about God speaking to him, in a slightly derogatory way, and I told him he had better watch what he was saying "because God is here right now and hears every word you are saying." The expression changed on his face so I could tell I had made an impression. One girl started reading part of our literature aloud, "WE, AS SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF ADAM, ARE ALL LIVING SOULS FROM THE BEGINNING OF LIFE." I told them the most important thing in their life is to have a relationship with Jesus Christ - "HE IS THE WAY, THE TRUTH AND THE LIFE." When we were leaving, several of the kids said goodbye and waved, and the class clown asked for a supply of literature "to give to my relatives."

     Our next visit to WOODBRIDGE left us with the same impression that we had received a little over a year before. These kids were different from the average junior higher. There was a touch of the old-fashioned in them which was refreshing. The class clown of our previous visit was there again. This time he was very serious. He stood there and proclaimed his anti-abortion position and took part in the discussions we were having with the kids, saying he remembered us from our previous visit. The boys and girls were talkative as before. The nice atmosphere was spoiled by a mother of one of the students pulling up behind us as we were about ready to leave. Screaming at us, she parked illegally with the car completely turned around so that the driver’s side was close to us. She carried on her tirade for almost a minute, saying we had no right to give our material to her daughter and that "I NEVER WANT TO SEE YOU BACK HERE AGAIN!" We could barely get a word in as she was so irate and screamed so loudly. One of the teachers came out after she had left and asked why she was yelling. We told him that she wasn’t happy with her daughter receiving our literature and she mentioned something about calling the police. He seemed a little surprised and smiled slightly as he went back toward the school. I caught up with him and complimented him on the unusually good behavior of the students.

I was out for another morning of literature distribution at MODESTO JUNIOR COLLEGE EAST, concentrating mostly on the cars parked around the school on the street to avoid confrontation with the ever present security guards. After placing about 400 packets of information under the windshield wipers of cars, I walked along the sidewalk handing our materials to students passing by. One young man gave me a friendly greeting saying, "I’M GLAD YOU PEOPLE ARE HERE AGAIN." He said the last time you were here he had given our information to two girls he knew. "ONE OF THEM CHANGED HER MIND ABOUT AN ABORTION." he volunteered. He asked for a supply of literature to give to other people, which I willingly gave to him.

It was quite a day for Anne Potje and me - nothing went as planned! We departed from her house in Union City, sped along the 880 Freeway to the lunch break at San Leandro High, and the kids never came out. Apparently, the school policy was changed since the previous year to a closed campus at lunchtime.

     Our next stop was San Lorenzo High. The same thing happened - no one came out. I realized then that both of these schools had been hot beds of gang violence, and undoubtedly the school administration had opted for closed campuses during the lunch breaks.

     We made our way to CHABOT COLLEGE, and after leafleting a parking lot area, we were confronted by the school security guards. They immediately communicated with the school office via their walkie-talkie and then demanded that we remove the literature from the cars. "WHAT KIND OF POLICY DO YOU HAVE AT THIS SCHOOL TO ACCOMMODATE OUR RIGHTS OF FREE SPEECH?" I asked. "YOU HAVE TO ASK PERMISSION AT THE OFFICE," they answered, still insisting that we remove the literature from the cars, which I wasn’t about to do. I told them I wanted to go to the office first and settle this matter. Anne and I followed one of the security guards who walked an unfriendly 15 feet in front of us all the way and finally reached the school administration office on the second story of the building located in the heart of the campus. While we waited for a few minutes, I soon discovered the pro-abortion bent of the security guard, a man in his mid-forties, as his attitude became hostile when I began to talk with him. "YOU’RE PRO-ABORTION, AREN’T YOU?" I said as I began to walk away from him. He neither affirmed nor denied it, but his angry expression gave him away.

     We were finally admitted to the person in charge, a very vocal black administrator approximately the same age as the security guard. I told him we had a right to distribute literature. He said, "YOU’RE RIGHT, BUT WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO TELL YOU HOW, WHEN AND WHERE." "THIS IS FREE SPEECH??" I said to myself as I began an argument with him which lasted a few minutes. The man kept insisting that the place where the school gave us permission was "behind the school." "BEHIND THE SCHOOL?" I asked incredulously. We requested an escort to this "free speech" area. There were a small number of students coming and going in this area (next to the college book store and cafeteria). In order to avoid being pressed further to remove the literature from the cars, Anne and I stood there and passed out about 100 packets. I asked the students when the most busy time of the day occurred in that area. 11:00 AM on Tuesdays and Thursdays was the answer. Almost all the while we distributed the literature the security guard sat a short distance away with his eye on us. He finally decided to leave. "HAVE A NICE DAY!" he said as he took off.

We distributed literature at MARK TWAIN JR HIGH in Modesto. During the month of May we experienced some of the fruits of our labor when we began receiving calls from that school:

     An 8th grade student called for information regarding a debate one evening. We promptly sent him the appropriate information for a school debate. Later a girl called from the same school with the story that her teacher was forcing her to take the "pro-choice" side in a debate. She mentioned that a boy going to MARK TWAIN JR HIGH had given her our number. She wondered if we had any "pro-choice" materials, saying that she had been calling all over and couldn’t find anything. I told her about the usual pro-choice rhetoric and also mentioned to her that it wasn’t fair for her teacher to force her to take the pro-choice side when she was, apparently, pro-life.

     The young man called back again a week later to get more ammunition. Then he told me that he had received our literature the day we were at MARK TWAIN at the end of the year. "I DIDN’T THINK MUCH ABOUT ABORTION BEFORE I SAW YOUR LITERATURE," he said, "BUT THAT LOVE AND LET LIVE PAMPHLET YOU GAVE ME REALLY OPENED MY EYES. I ALSO WAS AFFECTED BY THE DIARY OF AN UNBORN CHILD." He told me that he had taken an anonymous survey involving fifty girls in his class asking the question, "Would you ever have an abortion?" The response was forty-nine No’s and one Yes. He told me he planned to hold up the picture of the baby’s head with the caption FREEDOM OF CHOICE I had mailed to him, for the class to see at the very end. I suggested that he be sure to bring God into the arguments he was giving on abortion: "EVERYONE BELIEVES IN GOD AND THERE IS NO DEFENSE AGAINST THE ARGUMENT THAT ABORTION IS WRONG BECAUSE GOD SAYS IT IS," I told him. At the end of our conversation he mentioned that his apparently pro-choice teacher ridiculed the survey that he had made and told him that it was presented in the wrong way. "I CAN’T UNDERSTAND THIS TEACHER," he remarked. "SHE ACTS LIKE SHE HAS CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLES-AGAINST LYING AND CHEATING AND ALL THAT-BUT SHE IS FOR MURDER!"

Adeline Choi and I went to MANTECA HIGH at a noon hour lunch break on a Friday in May. Across the street from the school are two lunch places, side by side, where may of the students gather. I approached four or five students sitting on top and around a lunch table. My first encounter was with a girl about seventeen who answered me with the foulest language imaginable. I let her know emphatically what I thought of her language and how bad it sounded coming out of a young girl’s mouth. She said she was for "freedom of choice." Then I told her that she had a choice all right on having an abortion, but the choice was really choosing Heaven or Hell. She gave a little laugh of unbelief and said, "DO YOU MEAN IF I HAVE AN ABORTION I’M GOING TO HELL? ALL I HAVE TO DO IS SAY I’’M SORRY." "IT’S NOT THAT EASY," I answered her. "WITH YOUR ARROGANT ATTITUDE IT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE TO BE SORRY. THE LORD ONLY RESPONDS TO HUMBLE REPENTANCE."

     Another young girl sitting on top of the table asked me several times to leave. I finally said to her, "LISTEN, YOU’RE NOT SCARING ME AND I’M NOT LEAVING SO QUIT TRYING." One young man said he agreed that abortion is wrong. Later I saw him studying the literature and showing it to a friend.

     Adeline and I then made our way across the street to the side of the school where some of the kids were coming back from lunch. After about ten minutes of distributing materials, suddenly we were approached by a security guard, a large woman in her early forties. (These hired people are chosen, apparently, for their aggressiveness, and they are not pleasant to deal with.) This woman kept insisting that we were on school property; in fact, she said school property was two blocks in every direction. I informed her about our Constitutional rights to distribute literature on the public sidewalk and showed her the statement verifying this from the California Attorney General’s office. This didn’t phase her at all, and she called the school principal on her walkie-talkie. The principal arrived and took off with my paper from the Attorney General. By that time we had had enough of the woman security guard’s nasty behavior and tried to move away from her. As we walked, we started passing out literature to the students as they were still coming back from lunch. We passed out our packets to four large boys. The woman security guard, true to her belligerent nature, pushed the boys around and grabbed the literature out of their hands.

     After we had made our way back to one of the fast food places across the street, the school principal approached me handing the Attorney General’s statement back to me saying we had no right to distribute literature on the sidewalk next to the school. (Don’t confuse me with the facts!) Adeline saw him coming out of one of the lunch places, and soon after the proprietor came out and asked to see our literature. "IS THAT ALL IT IS?" he asked as he quickly glanced at it and went back inside. Obviously, the principal had asked him to try to chase us off. All in all, we were fairly successful, handing out about 200 packets to the students in spite of all the opposition.

It was a mild day in early April that brought us to the busy city of Sacramento - Adeline Choi, Tess Showalter, her two children, Cathy and Jason, and I, The first school of the day was ARCADE INTERMEDIATE (Sixth, Seventh & Eighth Grades). There were no sidewalks in front of the school and very little front landscaping area. Four busses were parked there as we got out of our stationwagon almost in the nick of time as we had taken a wrong turn on the freeway and were off our schedule.

     There was immediate trouble from an aggressive woman teacher in her early forties who kept insisting that we leave as we began handing out the literature. She took the packets away from some of the kids who were holding them in their hands. The school principal then appeared on the scene - an arrogant, loud-mouthed bully who kept shouting at us, saying we were breaking the law and demanding that we leave in the same sentence. He didn’t stop for breath as he carried on his tirade, making it difficult for us to get a word in edgewise. I did manage to tell him that we were within our Constitutional rights of free speech and that he was breaking the law by trying to stop us. "TAKE ME TO COURT!" he said sarcastically.

     The school kids sitting on the busses as they were getting reach to depart were obviously enjoying the excitement as some of them held their thumbs up and made comments from the bus windows. Several middle schoolers asked for the packets from the bus windows as they held out their arms through the windows, and we willingly complied. At one point the principal forcibly grabbed the literature I was holding in my hands as I was talking to him and refused to return it. Tess Showalter and I tried to tell him that the area next to the street (which would have been the sidewalk area if there had been a sidewalk) was Constitutionally protected by the law. At one point he stepped back and proclaimed loudly, "THIS IS MY CAMPUS!!" The principal and woman teacher were obsessed with the idea of taking down our names and addresses, which we refused to give them several times. I was amused at their ridiculous tactic of suggesting that we exchange I.D.’s.” I told his very unusual man that his attitude compared to that of other school principals we had encountered was "one of the worst." He said "thank you" and I wasn’t sure whether or not he took this for a compliment because of his bizarre behavior. I also told him that I knew by his attitude that he was for abortion. He made no comment.

     The next day (Saturday afternoon) our LIFE LINE phone began to ring. I received three or four calls in a row from what I believed to be one family or friends gathered in one household. One claimed to be the older sister of a 12-year-old girl and another a 13-year-old. I was at first bombarded with ridiculous lies saying that dozens of kids came jome crying because they were so upset over the abortion pictures. My mind went back to the students on the bus - most of them laughing and having a great time when we were there. I also laughed to myself when they suggested that the principal was pro-life, telling them they were lying. I said if kids are old enough to have sex, they are old enough to see the consequences - abortion, etc. I also told them they were probably feeling guilty about something or they wouldn’t be calling me long distance from Sacramento. When the mother of the girls got on the phone and started swearing at me, I hung up.

     A few minutes later one of the girls called back and asked to talk. I told her if she would calm down and talk sensibly, I would be glad to talk with her. I soon found out what was bothering her. It was our comments on staying pure in our literature (SIX SUGGESTIONS THAT WILL HELP YOU KEEP YOURSELF PURE). In the course of our conversation, she said that she had a sexual experience with one young man (her first) and was obviously guilty about it, although she kept trying to justify it saying that she felt sorry for the boy because he had just lost his mother. She told me she was a Christian who attended church. I asked her if she thought it was right to bring this young man and herself to the pit of Hell and risk her eternal life just to make him feel better. I emphasized the importance of purity and suggested that she pray about her situation - now that she had engaged in sex, it would be easier to do it again. I also let her know that this sexual sin could be clouding her vision and making it diffic ult for her to see that abortion is wrong. All through our conversation, she kept getting back to the pictures of abortions, saying that we had no right to distribute them at her school and that we should have asked permission. I asked her if the pictures offended her so much, why didn’t the FACT of abortion - over 4,000 dying every day - bother her? Why wasn’t she doing something to try to stop it?

     The general impression that I received from these phone calls was that we had done a great deal of good at ARCADE INTERMEDIATE. The scene that the school principal made in front of the school raised the issue to a boiling point and brought much more attention to the literature being distributed. There was enough material passed out to the kids to ensure that it was being passed around to everyone on the school busses. I was glad to receive the phone calls. The literature had obviously "reached them" to a large extent or they would not be calling LIFE LINE long distance from Sacramento.

     It was a beautiful spring day in April as I made my way on the busy 99 Freeway to the big city of Sacramento. I looked forward to leafleting SACRAMENTO CITY COLLEGE as all the parking is located across the street from the school. The cars are parked along several winding city streets, and there is no opposition from school security.

     One of the first cars I approached was occupied by a male student in his early twenties who reluctantly took the literature I handed to him, and, as usual, the ten-minute conversation I had with him ended up in a discussion on his relationship with Jesus Christ. He told me that we can all interpret the Scriptures as we like. I replied, "YOU DON’T HAVE TO ‘INTERPRET’ THEM. JUST READ THEM." We had been talking about the prophecies in the Bible which speak of Jesus.

     After walking around for an hour and 20 minutes putting packets under the windshield wipers, a car pulled up beside me. "I’M SORRY TO HAVE TO TELLYOU THIS." The man in his early thirties told me, "BUT SOMEONE IS TAKING SOME OF YOUR LITERATURE OFF THE CARS." We then embarked on a conversation which lasted about 20 minutes in which we discussed the world situation, the drug problem, and finally, his relationship with Jesus Christ. (This man was a former altar boy.) He had left the Catholic Church to "follow his own star" and now seemed to be a hodgepodge of many religions and beliefs. Our conversation was friendly, but I told him he was going away from God: "JESUS CHRIST IS ETERNAL GOD, THE SECOND PERSON OF THE TRINITY" I said in response to his comment that Jesus is really Michael the Archangel. His "intellectualism" was showing when he commented that the Bible was too simplistic. I couldn’t help laughing. I told him he had better start really reading it and he would find that Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life. We parted with my promise to pray for his conversion every morning for a week. He said he would pray for me too.

     Our next stop was CALIFORNIA MIDDLE SCHOOL just a mile away from the college. I waited on the corner next to a city bus. Soon the kids began to pile out of the school and walked over to where I was standing to board the bus. They looked at the literature making comments to each other. This information was "brand new" to them. They are not being told about this in the schools. There was no trouble from the school authorities, but later on I received an angry phone call from a mother who said she wanted our address so that she could sue us. (We have been threatened many, many times with lawsuits, but it never happens. What we are doing is legal and they soon find this out.)