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Obama's Abortion Politics

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 29, 2009

President Obama may not want the issue of abortion and reproductive rights to be a major focus early in his presidency, but he and his party quickly put it in the spotlight.

Within a week of being sworn in, he lifted the Bush administration's ban on federal funding for international family planning programs that provide abortion information or counseling to clients.

He tried to do it on the sly, perhaps out of sensitivity to the thousands who marched for life in Washington last Thursday, but he signed the executive order late in the day Friday, as if it would be lost amid other headlines.

The Vatican, along with pro-life leaders rightly condemned the president's move. The ban has come and gone between Democrat and Republican administrations since President Reagan first initiated it in 1984.

We accept that abortion is not likely to be outlawed and it should be available to women or girls in cases of rape or incest or to protect the life of the mother.

That said, abortion should be rare, and it should play no part in family planning. Abortion should never be a method of birth control, and our tax dollars should not go to organizations that counsel it is. And so we strongly oppose lifting the ban.

Abortion should not be an easy choice. "Getting rid of a baby" raises many complex questions, involving two lives. Scientific innovations that have allowed us to observe the miraculous development of a baby from conception to birth underscore the consequences of choosing abortion.
Obama says that soon his administration "will initiate a fresh conversation on family planning," in hopes of finding some common ground. He says he has "no desire to continue the stale and fruitless debate" over abortion.

But he made another promise during the campaign: to sign into law the Freedom of Choice Act, which, if passed by Congress, would effectively end all prohibitions against abortion prior to fetal viability.

We hope the president will reconsider. People are not unfeeling about the problems - even tragic consequences - attendant to some women or girls who find themselves pregnant. Individual members of this editorial board are opposed to abortion on both religious and moral grounds and believe respect for life should begin at conception. But collectively as a board we understand not all Americans, or even all faiths, share that belief.

The Freedom of Choice Act, however, would have radical consequences. It would likely spell the end of parental notification laws many Americans, and surely most parents, support. These laws require girls under age 18 to tell a parent they are contemplating ending a pregnancy. Some opponents even claim it would call into question the law outlawing partial-birth abortion, the barbaric procedure that takes the life of a baby in the last days of a late-term pregnancy. That's not entirely clear, but the law does allow, if not encourage, abortion on demand before fetal viability.

Certainly the president must contend with abortion advocacy groups and even powerful members of Congress, such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who made headlines last weekend for supporting a provision of the economic stimulus package that would expand Medicaid coverage of family planning programs. Republicans panned her, properly questioning how family planning would stimulate the economy. Obama, ever the pragmatist, agreed to take the offensive measure out of the proposal.

Obviously the abortion question remains an emotional, highly controversial issue. Obama can't change that. But we do wish the president had addressed it with more respect for those who don't want their tax dollars paying to encourage a procedure they consider immoral.

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