Dr Carolyn Bennett
MP for St Paul's, ON (Liberal), former family doc and abortion provider
I was an FP at the time and we felt this unbelievable huge relief. All of us had people going to Buffalo, doing whatever it took — it was a pretty awful time. I remember my first abortion, as a med student in Barbados. She had red hair and braces, she was in grade nine, age 14 — the daughter of the local prostitute, who had been renting her out. I realized it was so important to get her back to grade nine. So many people had their educations interrupted.

Paul Steckle
MP for Huron-Bruce, ON (Liberal), co-chair of the Parliamentary Pro-Life Caucus
Twenty years later, it means we have killed another two million unborn children in that time. That's the population of Saskatchewan! Who knows how many politicians, scientists, economists, doctors were destroyed before they had the chance? That is the real tragedy of 20 years ago.

Judy Rebick
Journalist, former spokesperson for the Ontario Coalition for Abortion Clinics
The day the news came out I watched people on the streetcars and I'd never seen it before — everyone was talking about it, saying "Right on. Dr Morgentaler is a hero." He's sort of a populist hero. He really inspired people. Truck drivers would give me money for him.

Margaret Somerville
Founding director of the McGill Centre for Medicine, Law and Ethics
There was a lot of interesting legal stuff at the time — we were all following it. I had a really surprising encounter with [Dr Morgentaler] in a TV debate about 18 months ago. I asked him, you have a woman who is 26 weeks pregnant, nothing wrong with the baby, and she's changed her mind, say, she broke up with her boyfriend and doesn't want to have the baby — would he do the abortion? I was completely surprised. He said no, that baby was viable, there's nothing wrong with the baby. I looked at him and said, "I am really surprised. Maybe you and I are not as far apart as we think." I don't think we should prohibit abortion in the early stages of pregnancy, but we should absolutely prohibit it after the viability of the fetus.

Dr Norman Barwin
Ob/gyn and President of Canadians for Choice
It was very exciting. I was the president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of Canada at the time and we were lobbying the government and the Senate to try to get the Morgentaler case to be seen in�a positive way. Prior to that, it was the opinion of the physician and the hospital committee that mattered — someone else was deciding on your fate, so it was a great victory for women's rights.

Dr Dorothy Shaw
Former president of the Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of Canada and the International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics
Since 1988 I have been able to put the Morgentaler decision in a global context as a result of my international involvement in women's health. Abortion is a complex reality in every country of the world — unsafe abortion contributes to 13% of global maternal mortality and women living in poverty are disproportionately represented. Women seek unsafe abortion when they have no realistic alternative. Judging them is unhelpful. Based on global experience, having abortion in the domain of health and not criminal law, is the best option for women. In Canada, we still have work to do in terms of effective comprehensive sexuality education and contraceptive services, as well as addressing social inequalities.

Heather Mallick
Journalist and feminist
The triumph of the Morgentaler decision was that suddenly women had an 'out.' Twenty years later, I would rather die than see other women lose the freedom Dr Morgentaler gave them.

Tom Wappel
MP for Scarborough Southwest, ON (Liberal)
How sad it is that the intelligentsia of this country can be brainwashed by propaganda. From the initial decision of the Supreme Court saying the law was unevenly applied, we have morphed into saying women have a�right to abortion, which is a false statement. But for me to state that is virtual heresy.

Dr Barbara Lent
University of Western Ontario associate dean of Equity and Gender Issues and Faculty Health
Dr Morgentaler is a bold and courageous physician who made a substantial contribution to ensuring women have safe access to various reproductive choices, both in terms of the direct services he provided but also in that he trained many many physicians to be providers. But the technical side of abortion provision is not well covered in most medical schools or training programs, so people have to be particularly interested in learning how to do this and seek out the training.

Dr Willard Johnston
President of Canadian Physicians for Life
I grieve for the playgrounds in this country which are missing the sounds of the voices of those children.

Alexa McDonough
MP for Halifax, NS (NDP)
When the decision came down, I had been in politics for 10 years, involved in the women's movement and past my childbearing years. So it didn't affect me in terms of my body, but it did affect my soul, my small-p political outlook.

Maurice Vellacott
MP for Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK (Conservative)
For pro-lifers, there was actually a positive element to the Morgentaler decision. But you'd never know it, given how the decision has been twisted and misrepresented by radical abortion activists and many in the media, and even in the medical and legal professions, for almost 20 years now. And this is tragic, because in that decision, the Supreme Court unanimously declared that Parliament has a responsibility to create a new law to protect the unborn child - a new law which would not have the constitutional problems inherent in the previous law. Canada grades an 'incomplete' on that Supreme Court assignment.