ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, September 20, 1996 TAG: 9609200051
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: Associated Press
NOTE: Lede
Scoring a big win for anti-abortion forces, the House voted Thursday to override President Clinton's veto of a bill that bans a form of late-term abortion. But the Senate seemed unlikely to follow suit.
The apparent lack of sufficient support there makes it unlikely that the attempt to overturn the veto of the so-called partial-birth abortion bill will succeed. However, the House vote sent a message that the issue will not be ignored in the presidential campaign.
Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole has campaigned actively on the issue. He said Thursday that as more Americans become aware of the ``horrible'' practice, ``the president has been left almost alone, defending the indefensible.''
When Clinton vetoed the bill in April, surrounded by five women who had undergone the procedure, he criticized the legislation by saying it ``does not allow women to protect themselves from serious threats to their health.''
The 285-137 vote was four more than the two-thirds needed for an override in the House. Seventy Democrats joined 215 Republicans to support revival of the bill, which would ban a procedure - generally performed in the third trimester - in which the fetus is partly delivered through the birth canal before being killed.
Virginia's Democratic Reps. L.F. Payne of Nelson County, Norman Sisisky of Petersburg and Jim Moran of Alexandria joined Republican Reps. Bob Goodlatte of Roanoke, Thomas Bliley of Richmond, Herbert Bateman of Newport News, Tom Davis of Fairfax County and Frank Wolf of Fairfax County in voting to override the veto. Democratic Reps. Rick Boucher of Abingdon, Owen Pickett of Virginia Beach and Robert "Bobby" Scott of Newport News voted to let the veto stand.
If enacted into law, the ban would mark the first time Congress has made illegal a specific abortion procedure since the Supreme Court ruled in 1973 that a woman has the right to an abortion.
Supporters of the ban emphasized with pictures and speeches the gruesomeness of the procedure - ``How can anyone in this chamber or in the White House defend sticking a pair of scissors into a partially born baby's head so as to puncture the child's skull?'' asked Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J.
But anti-abortion lawmakers also contended that the issue went well beyond such abortions, which are relatively rare.
``Our moment in history is marked by a mortal conflict between a culture of death and a culture of life, and today, here and now, we must choose sides,'' said House Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill.
``It's a frontal attempt on Roe vs. Wade, plain and simple,'' said Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., who supports abortion rights.
The bill, if passed, would let doctors perform the procedure only if they can show it was the only way to save the mother's life. A doctor who performed the procedure illegally could face fines and two years in prison. The bill also would let the father or maternal grandparents file a civil lawsuit against the doctor for monetary damages.
Opponents of the measure argued that it would take away a lifesaving procedure used when the fetus is found to have serious abnormalities or the mother faces serious health problems.
``I didn't choose for my son to die,'' Vikki Stella of Naperville, Ill., told a news conference. ``I wanted this baby. I chose to take him off life support, which was my body. Congress has no right interfering in our lives and our tragedies.'' She had the procedure two years ago after it was discovered that her fetus had no brain.
Rep. Pat Schroeder, D-Colo., said, ``We've had people so engaged with their pictures and charges and screaming and playing politics in women's uteruses that we have not really dealt with the safe motherhood issue.''
The Senate passed the bill last December by a 54-44 vote, well short of the two-thirds margin needed to override, and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., acknowledged Thursday, ``It will be hard to override.''
But he said it was an important issue and the Senate would hold a vote, possibly next Thursday.
Regardless of the outcome, abortion foes promised that it would remain prominent in the presidential campaign.
LENGTH: Medium: 79 linesby CNB