Most New Yorkers hadn’t heard of Bart Stupak before he attached his devastating anti-abortion amendment to the House’s health-care-reform bill three weeks ago. We know a lot more about him now, of course: that he lives in a Christian rooming house on C Street; that he’s a former state trooper. He has become a symbol of legislative zealotry, living proof that the fight over the right to choose will always attract a more impassioned opposition than defense. (As Harrison Hickman, a former pollster for NARAL, put it to me: “If you believe that choosing the wrong side of the issue means spending eternal life in Hades, of course you’re going to be more focused on it.”) Just a week after the vote, when I reached the Michigan Democrat as he was driving across his district, he seemed dumbfounded that anyone found his brinkmanship surprising. “I said to anyone who’d listen: ‘Do you want health care, or do you want to fight out abortion?’ ” says Stupak. He points out that he’d nearly managed to bring down a rule about abortion funding earlier in the summer, this time in a bill about spending in the District of Columbia. “I said, ‘Look, that was a shot across your bow,’ ” he recalls. “ ‘I was being polite to you. That was a warning.’ And the leadership just blew us off.”

Until it realized it couldn’t, of course. And the results sent chills through the pro-choice world, dampening what was otherwise an impressive victory for Democrats on the issue of universal health care. If Stupak’s amendment holds, then any health-insurance plan that’s either listed on the government-run exchange or accepts federal subsidies—which would likely be almost all of them—would not be allowed to cover abortions. (The Senate bill is better thus far, but what the legislation will ultimately be, assuming it passes at all, is anyone’s guess.) Four days after the vote, Kate Michelman, the former head of NARAL, and Frances Kissling, the former head of Catholics for Choice, warned of an ominous new landscape in a Times op-ed: “The House Democrats reinforced the principle that a minority view on the morality of abortion can determine reproductive-health policy for American women.”

But is that actually right? Was Stupak’s truly the minority view?

Read it all.

Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Health & Medicine • --The 2009 American Health Care Reform Debate • Life Ethics • Religion & Culture • * Economics, Politics • Politics in General • House of Representatives • Senate • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.

1. dwstroudmd wrote: Though heavily slanted in the pro-abortion mentality and mode of expression, this article notes significant realities.  (1) Legalisation of abortion was not and is not a mandate of the people of this country; it was imposed by judicial fiat.  (2) Abortion kills.  (3) The rising generation appreciates personal responsibility for pregnancy and does not think like their grandparents on the matter. December 10, 8:40 am | [comment link]

2. Branford wrote: Abortion is also almost always elective surgery, and elective surgeries are often not covered by insurance, so there’s no reason for the government to pay for elective surgery. December 10, 10:28 am | [comment link]

3. New Reformation Advocate wrote: Like Dr. Stroud (#1), I think it’s an informative article, if you can get past the liberal bias and not be put off by it.  I found it encouraging. David Handy+ December 10, 3:59 pm | [comment link]

4. montanan wrote: Agreed - very well written.  Tragically denies the reality she only alludes to - that this is a life being violently ended - and paints pro-life/anti-abortion protesters as monolithic and uncaring.  Nevertheless, she engages the issue better than most I’ve seen. December 11, 2:38 am | [comment link]

Registered members must log in to comment.