"WASHINGTON - They came by the busloads, young and old, male and female, from points north, south, east and west.

They crowded the capital's subways and pouring onto the National Mall in droves - there to make a statement for a woman's right to make her own reproductive choices.

"We need to make a statement and stand up for what we believe in," said Denise Winegard, an 18-year-old James Madison University student who was carrying a sign that said, "Women have a voice, so give them a choice."

JMU schoolmates Meghan Hennick, 18, Dawn Hillard, 21, and Caroline Mullen, 18, were with her. They joined thousands of others to walk around the Mall in what was being billed as the largest abortion-rights demonstration in more than a decade.

Under overcast skies, the mood was purposeful, jubilant, even whimsical as marchers, a few in costumes, carried cleverly worded and acerbically worded signs that attacked President Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft, but also said that what a woman decides to do with her body is her business.

"Stay out of my uterus," said one sign. Another: "Keep your rosaries off my ovaries." Yet another, "My body is not public property."

On the other side of the issue, protesters standing along Pennsylvania Avenue carried signs that proclaimed, "Abortion is genocide" and "Women deserve better." Some of the signs were graphic, with oversized images of bloody babies intended to show the effects of abortion.

The protesters and marchers were kept separate by metal barricades and uniformed officers but still exchanged words. The chant of the abortion-rights ralliers - "Whose choice? Our choice" - drowned out most of the counterdemonstrators.

Along with abortion, emergency contraception and sex education, gay marriage and access to health care were also issues on the minds of marchers, who came at the urging of groups such as the National Organization for Women, Planned Parenthood, the American Civil Liberties Union and a consor- tium of other march sponsors.

Various police sources informally estimated the throng at between 500,000 and 800,000, according to The Associated Press. An estimated 500,000 protested for abortion rights in 1992.

For the JMU students, the reproductive-rights issue hit home last year when university officials, at the urging of a state legislator, banned on-campus dispensing of emergency contraception. That decision was reversed, but the controversy mobilized students.

"I think the whole [emergency-contraception-pill] issue has brought a lot of awareness to campus," said Hillard, carrying a sign that said, "March in April, Vote in November." But Hillard said she probably would have attended the march even if there had not been the JMU incident.

At issue for many is what they see as an assault on a woman's right to a safe and legal abortion as legislators across the country wrote laws that make abortions more difficult to get.

Such efforts have, for instance, mandated 24-hour waiting periods from the time a woman requests an abortion until she can have one, required parents to be notified and to give permission for minors to have abortions, and required abortion clinics to meet stricter building and operating standards than other medical offices that do similarly invasive procedures.

Other issues marchers said they cared about include access to emergency contraception and making accurate sex education available to schoolchildren instead of just teaching abstinence.

Before the march, a number of celebrities, including actress Cybill Shepherd and former "Saturday Night Live" cast member Ana Gasteyer, addressed the crowd, speaking in support of women's reproductive choices and urging the marchers on.

In the crowd, Violet Dixon, a board member of the Virginia League for Planned Parenthood, was glad to see the day bring out young people such as Adrienne Adger, 21, and Jessica Bennett, University of Richmond juniors.

"I was so afraid it would be all old folks," said Dixon.

"If the Supreme Court decides to overturn Roe v. Wade, there will be a big protest. It will be young people leading the way. This is a young people's issue."

Adger and Bennett are among a growing number of college-age women being recruited to the reproductive-rights movement by Planned Parenthood.

"A lot of women our age don't recognize how important the right to choose is," said Adger, a member of the University of Richmond chapter of VOX: Voice for Planned Parenthood.

"No government should determine morals for the whole of the community," added Bennett, 21. A little more than 100 students rode the buses that left UR yesterday morning.

Much of the momentum for the march is the feeling among abortion-rights advocates that the 1973 decision that legalized abortion in the United States is in jeopardy of being overturned.

"My granddaughter could grow up with fewer rights than her mother had," said Grace Sparks, executive director of the Virginia League for Planned Parenthood, who was at the march with her husband, Linc Sparks, her daughter, Elli Sparks, and granddaughter, Sophia Staropoli, 6.

"It's a scary thought," said Sparks, who is retiring in August after more than 25 years in the abortion-rights movement. "I think [Chief] Justice [William H.] Rehnquist said it well. The Roe decision could be a like a facade in a movie scene. You have that right but won't be able to exercise it."

Elli Sparks remembered other abortion-rights marches with her mom.

"I've always been proud of her and proud that she has been involved with a mission," said Elli Sparks. "Growing up, she talked about sex and birth control in a healthy way. We got information from a safe source."

The Sparkses were with a Richmond contingent that boarded about a dozen buses at three locations yesterday morning - Richmond International Raceway, Virginia Commonwealth University and the University of Richmond - for the trip to Washington.

Sue Walker, 54, was there for personal and global reasons. She was a mother at 15, she said, and did not have a choice about what to do. She had the baby and married the father at the urging of both parents, but the marriage didn't last.

Walker said she loves all three of her children dearly but is glad they have more choices. She said her children know about her experience and she is glad her daughters had information on birth control when they decided to become sexually active.

As for abortion, "Every situation is different, and every choice is based on that situation," Walker said. "I don't think the government should decide."

"I had people who helped me. I spent six months in a home for unwed mothers, which is what they did in 1965." Teen pregnancies, she said, were not supposed to happen, and "nobody wanted to deal with the fact" that they did happen.

The march was a family affair for the Brookses - father Michael, mother Wendy, Bonnie, 17, and James, 13. They made the trip from Richmond and share similar views on issues such as the need for sex education to be taught in the schools and a woman's right to make decisions about what happens to her body.

James Brooks noted with irony an image of male authority that abortion-rights advocates often point out.

"I remember when Bush signed something about abortion," he said. "It was all men standing around." Abstinence education, he said, is not working." (Tammie Smith, The Richmond Times-Dispatch, April 26, 2004)

Contact Tammie Smith at (804) 649-6572 or tlsmith@timesdispatch.com

Editor's Note: Pictures were taken by George Loper and have been inserted in the article for illustrative purposes only.