ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, September 27, 1996 TAG: 9609270044
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
ADVOCATES of a federal ban on "partial-birth abortions" remind us of prosecutors who stress the grisliness of a crime rather than evidence that the defendant committed it.
Proponents of a ban dwell on the gruesomeness of what doctors call "intact dilation and extraction." But many medical procedures are gruesome. For Americans of mixed mind about abortion - for those (including this newspaper's editorial board) who believe in neither an all-encompassing right to abortion nor an all-encompassing prohibition of it - the issue ought to be whether the procedure is so abused that federal legislation is desirable.
That's not at all clear. Because it isn't, President Clinton was right five months ago to veto the proposal, and the Senate was right on Thursday to sustain his veto.
The irony in focusing on partial-birth abortion as a "wedge issue" is that the procedure is not only rare but also rarely if ever employed for purposes that might reasonably be called casual. If nothing else, common sense suggests that women who carry pregnancies almost to term are less likely than others to opt for an abortion for the sake of convenience. If there are any physicians who perform such abortions - or, for that matter, any abortions so late in a pregnancy - when the fetus isn't severely malformed or the mother's health isn't endangered, we have yet to see one publicly identified.
Solid statistical evidence of exactly how many partial-birth abortions are performed and for what reasons would be helpful, but apparently does not exist. Ban opponents have relied instead on anecdotes to note the bleak medical circumstances in which such abortions occur. Even so, that's at least as relevant as the undocumented assertions and gory descriptions offered by the ban's supporters.
By all indications, the purpose of this override vote - held so long after the president vetoed the bill - was to make political points for November's elections. Clinton and the members of Congress who voted to uphold the veto aren't saying they reject any limits on a women's right to have an abortion. They rejected the limit that was written into this legislation.
Indeed, at the time of his veto, Clinton said he would sign a late-term abortion ban that included an exception for the health of the mother. Under the congressional proposal, however, physicians who perform the procedure would be exempt from criminal penalties and civil liability only if they could show it was the only way to save the mother's life. The safest way to save the mother's life, or likeliest way to save the mother's life, or the most probable way for the best medical outcome - those wouldn't be enough.
America should be re-examining its abortion policies, and such examination might well lead to new restrictions. Have advances in medical technology made obsolete the legal definition of fetal viability? Has the mother's health been defined too broadly (to include, for example, psychological health) in allowing late-term abortions? How are fetal rights altered by severe abnormality? Above all: How can we best reduce the number of abortions occurring in this country?
These are hard questions that call for rigorous thought. They won't be answered by emotional appeals and gotcha political games.
LENGTH: Medium: 59 linesby CNB