Plain Quaker Nurse-In

June 16, 2005

I recent­ly read a New York Times arti­cle on the resurg­ing phe­nom­e­non of nurse-ins, designed to high­light the lack of laws giv­ing moth­ers the right to nurse in pub­lic. Lit­tle did I real­ize a plain dress­ing Quak­er near Grand Rapids Michi­gan was at the cen­ter of its nurse-in! From the local (link-unfriendly) newspaper:

As a Quak­er woman, Jen­nifer Seif lives a mod­est and sim­ple life. Breast­feed­ing is nat­ur­al to her, and she has nursed her chil­dren while in the gro­cery store, the doc­tor’s office and dur­ing Quak­er meet­ings with­out a prob­lem. So the Grand Rapids woman was shocked and embar­rassed in April when Kent Coun­ty Clerk Mary Beth Hollinrake approached her while she was breast­feed­ing her infant son, Micah…“It’s shock­ing to me that any­one would be offend­ed.” The moth­er of three said she was wear­ing a cape dress — a gar­ment designed for dis­creet nursing…

I learned about this through the blog of Jenn and her hus­band Scott. Here’s Jen­n’s post on the inci­dent. For those won­der­ing about their local pro­tec­tion, the La Leche League has a fab­u­lous state-by-state list­ing of the nurs­ing laws.