HOUSE OKS ABORTION ADVICE `GAG RULE' VOTE REVERSES BUSH POLICY

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, March 26, 1993                   TAG: 9303260151
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium
HOUSE OKS ABORTION ADVICE `GAG RULE' VOTE REVERSES BUSH POLICY
The House voted Thursday to do away with government restrictions on abortion counseling after defeating an attempt to require parental notification for minors seeking abortions at federally funded clinics.
The House passed and sent to the Senate, 273-149, a bill that authorizes spending for family planning clinics and writes into federal law President Clinton's lifting of the Bush administration's ban on abortion counseling.
Supporters of Clinton's action wanted to lock into law the lifting of the so-called "gag rule" to reverse 12 years of Republican, anti-abortion policies.
Just before the House's final vote, the chamber rejected, 243-179, a Republican-led effort to prohibit clinics that receive federal money from performing abortions on minors unless a parent is notified 48 hours in advance.
Anti-abortion lawmakers maintained that young girls need permission for all sorts of things, such as getting an aspirin from the school nurse.
"Here we have an invasive procedure on a minor, and you want to say no notification," said Rep. Thomas Bliley, R-Va., who offered the amendment. "It doesn't seem to make sense."
But advocates of abortion rights resisted, arguing that only low-income teen-agers who had to go to subsidized clinics would be subject to the notification requirement.
"It becomes an issue of the haves and the have-nots; and the have-nots, as usual, lose," said Rep. Nydia Velazquez, D-N.Y.
Even some Democrats who support parental notification, such as Rep. J. Roy Rowland of Georgia, opposed Bliley's change because their states already had such laws.
He and other opponents said Bliley's strict language would have superseded state laws that already address parental notification.
The real battle over abortion in Congress is a few months away, when the Freedom of Choice Act - which guarantees a woman's right to abortion in case the Supreme Court ever overturns Roe vs. Wade - is considered.
That debate will largely focus on how much room states should get in restricting abortions. Thursday's debate offered a preview of how emotional that debate promises to be.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB