By Russell Shaw
It’s hardly news that politicians sometimes say things to particular audiences in hopes of pleasing them, without necessarily meaning to follow through later on what they seem to have promised. Perhaps that explains President Barack Obama’s odd performance on funding for elective abortions in health care reform. Perhaps. But I suspect something more basic is at work.
The fundamental concern driving pro-life Americans in the abortion debate — to protect unborn human life — appears simply not to matter much to our pro-choice president. This is not to say he’s an evil man. But on the record it is fair to suppose that in his moral universe the unborn possess negligible moral weight, while the right to choose abortion and act on that choice is a matter of the highest priority.
If that is correct, then soothing words directed now and then by Obama to an audience like the one at the Notre Dame commencement last spring are best understood as verbal counters in a political game aimed at advancing the right to choose while simultaneously jollying the gullible.
Passing over Obama’s well-documented promises to pro-abortion audiences, the statements he’s presumably intended for pro-life ears during the last eight months reflect something like this. And so we get the following.
At Notre Dame last May 17 the president said in part, “Let’s honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause.”
The health care debate moved into high gear soon after. On Aug. 19, speaking via a teleconference organized by religious groups, Obama protested health care “fabrications” including claims that legislation then moving forward provided public funding of abortion. On Aug. 23, in his weekly radio address, he followed that up by saying, “When it comes to the current ban on using tax dollars for abortions, nothing will change under reform.”
Next day a nonpartisan web site called FactCheck concluded that “despite what Obama said” the House bill really would use public funds to pay for abortion.
Even so, addressing Congress Sept. 9, Obama noted a “misunderstanding” that needed correcting. “Under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions and federal conscience laws will remain in place,” he explained.
Yet on Nov. 7 the House found it necessary to amend its bill by adopting the Stupak-Pitts amendment — essentially, the Hyde Amendment which since 1976 has barred federal funding of elective abortions and allowed it only in cases of rape, incest, and to save the mother’s life.
The president then repeated his endorsement of the “status quo” on funding. But although Stupak-Pitts — a.k.a. Hyde — is the status quo on this matter, Stupak-Pitts wouldn’t do, he said.
Shortly before Christmas the Senate defeated the same amendment that the House earlier passed. A few days later it approved a health care bill containing a so-called compromise on abortion funding that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and other pro-life groups said would allow public funding of elective abortions and require people with conscientious objections to help pay for them. Obama prefers the Senate bill to the House bill.
In sum, Obama’s public utterances don’t add up. He says he supports the status quo on abortion funding, but when push comes to shove he supports loosening up. This makes sense if one assumes he is prepared to give pro-lifers rhetoric but not substance. The health care fight will come to a head in the next several weeks, and the president could still change his tune. Unfortunately, that seems highly unlikely by now.
Russell Shaw is an OSV contributing editor.
