Family Fights Personal Battle against Partial-Birth Abortion.

Lori and Don Watts listened in growing indignation early in 1997 when pro-abortionists declared that partial-birth abortions were "necessary" when the "fetus" has severe disabilities. When they realized that these disabilities included ones that their five-year-old daughter Donna Joy was battling, the couple decided they had to speak out.

They contacted their congressman and eventually their senator, and joined the fight to ban the gruesome partial-birth abortion procedure. Their work and the work of so many other pro-life champions culminated in a joyous ceremony November 5, when President George W. Bush signed the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act into law.

The Wattses and their now 12-year-old daughter Donna Joy, who live in Greencastle, Pennsylvania, were in the audience that day. "It was a moment of vindication," Lori Watts told NRL News. "It was so exciting." President Bush even waved at Donna Joy, who "shot a big smile up at him," Watts said.

The family's struggles began in September 1991, when a sonogram showed that Mrs. Watts's seven-month-old unborn baby had serious brain injuries. The baby had hydrocephaly (water on the brain) and holoprosencephaly (HPE), which means that "some of the brain sensors are missing, and one side of the brain doesn't communicate with the other," Watts said.

Every doctor they saw advised them to have an abortion. "They said she was `incompatible with life,'" according to Watts. "There was no way she would survive outside of the womb."

The Wattses, however, would not give up on their baby insisting on giving her a chance to prove the doctors wrong. They also relied on their strong pro-life beliefs. "We're against abortion and always have been," Lori Watts said.

After four hospitals refused to admit her and care for her baby, she threatened one with a lawsuit unless it would help her deliver the baby.