March 17, 2008
John McCain has won the endorsement of some prominent pro-life political leaders. Yet he also has been the cause of some serious headaches for the pro-life movement.
But elections always involve choosing among particular alternatives, rather than insisting on an ideal. And when we look at the alternatives likely in November, it is clear John McCain offers pro-life voters by far the more appealing prospect.
The campaign finance reform legislation McCain sponsored with Sen. Russ Feingold (D., Wis.) has placed serious restrictions on the ability of pro-life groups (and others) to exercise their influence. More important, McCain has voted twice to try to overturn President Bush's embryonic stem-cell funding policy, thus offering what would amount to a taxpayer-funded incentive for the destruction of human embryos for research. Although he has suggested he may be open to rethinking his view as new science demonstrates alternatives to embryo-destruction, he has so far not reversed himself.
For me and other pro-life voters, these are serious concerns. But we must also consider that McCain's pro-life record as a whole is very strong. It is not the record of a politician hostile to the pro-life cause or generally unreliable on pro-life issues. He may have been led astray on stem-cell research - but he did co-sponsor Sen. Sam Brownback's bill prohibiting the creation of embryos by cloning for purposes of research in which they are killed. Contrast his position with those of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Both bitterly oppose the Brownback cloning ban and support the funding of embryo-destroying human cloning with taxpayer dollars.
Likewise on the issue of abortion, there is no comparison between
McCain's history of support for the right to life and Clinton's and Obama's
implacable opposition to it. While he has never been especially outspoken on
abortion-related questions (and is rumored to have sometimes opposed bringing
pro-life bills forward), there is no denying that his pro-life voting record is
strong and consistent. Indeed, it is one of the best in the
Senate.
The next president will name several hundred federal judges, probably including two or more Supreme Court justices. Sen. McCain has pledged to nominate judges who will faithfully interpret the Constitution, not legislate from the bench, and he has made clear that he thinks Justices Roberts and Alito are good models. Sens. Clinton or Obama, by contrast, would be certain - I repeat, certain - to nominate judges and justices who reject this view of the judge's role, and who are deeply committed to maintaining the regime of judicially mandated abortion on demand.
Moreover, McCain would uphold, and Clinton or Obama would overturn, crucial pro-life policies enacted by Republican Congresses or sustained by President Bush in recent years. For instance, the so-called Mexico City policy, first put in place by President Reagan to make sure taxpayer funds are not be used to promote or pay for abortions, would be preserved by a President McCain, but would be immediately reversed by a President Clinton or Obama. Bill Clinton overturned the policy during his first week in office; President Bush reinstated it. This is a clear point of difference, with many tiny human lives hanging in the balance.
Similarly, some key pro-life provisions in each year's federal budget would be in grave danger if a Democratic president and Congress were producing the budget: Amendments prohibiting the use of federal dollars to fund abortion (the Hyde amendment), to support international organizations involved in coercive abortion programs (the Kemp-Kasten amendment), to discriminate against health professionals who refuse to perform abortions (the Hyde-Weldon amendment), to fund abortions through the federal employee insurance program (the Smith amendment), to issue patents on human embryos (the Weldon amendment), and other crucial provisions will all be in peril if John McCain is defeated. Every pro-life citizen needs to think about that in considering what to do on Election Day.
And there is more. A Clinton or Obama administration would lead a jihad against the key pro-life legislative achievements of the last decade, including the partial-birth abortion ban, the Born Alive Infant Protection Act (which forbids the heinous practice of killing or failing to administer life-saving care to babies who survive attempted abortions and are born alive), and the Unborn Victims of Violence Act. McCain supported all these initiatives and would work to protect them from a hostile Democratic Congress.
Few elections in our lifetime have been as consequential for the pro-life cause as this year's is likely to be. The next president will likely determine the course of the Supreme Court for decades to come, and will make the difference between continuing the progress made by the pro-life movement in the last three decades or reversing course and reinforcing a culture of abortion and embryo destruction that rejects human equality.
Over 40 years of political struggle, the pro-life movement has learned not to make the perfect the enemy of the good. This crucial election is no time to forget that. Pro-life citizens should continue to press the argument with John McCain on points on which we disagree with him. But we should also support him and work hard to get him elected. In a race against Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama, he is by far the better pro-life choice.
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