Democrats yield to pro-lifers.

• Author: Conniff, Ruth
• Position: Column

Republicans in the House and Senate, on a rampage to restrict abortion, have passed seventy-one bills since 1995 to limit reproductive choice for women. Recently, the House voted 296 to 132 to overturn President Clinton's veto of a ban on so-called partial-birth abortion. The Senate will hold a veto-override vote around Labor Day, timed for the midterm election campaigns. Emboldened by all their successes, House pro-lifers in July even took a swipe at federal health coverage for some common forms of birth control--including the pill--which they consider "abortifacients." Margaret Sanger would be horrified.

Where are the Democrats, as the Republicans try to turn back the clock? Defensive, divided, running for cover.

Since 1995, the Republicans have gained ground in part because many Democrats have gone along, fearful of losing their seats over reasonable-sounding issues like late-term abortion and parental consent.

The most significant gain pro-lifers have made is in the debate over partial-birth abortion, where Democrats switched their votes in droves, becoming converts to the pro-life cause on this issue. Senator Tom Daschle, Democrat of South Dakota, after first voting against the broadly worded ban, last year turned around and proposed his own ban to compete with the Republicans. In a sign of the times, Daschle's rating from the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League (NARAL) dropped from 99 percent in 1995 to 65 percent in 1997.

In a recent vote in the House on the confusingly named Child Custody Protection Act, progressive Democrats joined Republicans to pass a bill that would make it a crime to help a young woman cross state lines to get an abortion without her parents' permission, if her home state requires parental consent.

Leftwing Democrats David Bonior of Michigan, David Obey of Wisconsin, Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, and Carolyn McCarthy of New York all voted for the bill.

McCarthy, who up until now had a 100 percent pro-choice voting record, said she makes a distinction when it comes to minors. "I feel very strongly, as a parent, that all efforts should be exhausted in order to encourage a minor to talk with her parents about the pregnancy," said McCarthy. "If this bill forces one child to establish a line of communication with her parents, then I think it's a good effort."

Kucinich, who has only a 12 percent approval rating from NARAL, is simply prolife. (He opposes U.S. funding for international family planning on...