McCain Urges GOP to Back Off on Pro-Life Platform
WASHINGTON -- March 1999 -- Republican presidential candidate and Arizona Sen. John McCain is calling on his party to alter its platform on abortion.
In a telephone interview Friday, McCain called for the party to revert to its 1980 platform on abortion, which opposes abortion but recognizes differing views on the issue among Republicans.
"I'm for going back to the platform as it was in 1980. I believe we are an inclusive party and we can be so without changing our principles," McCain said. McCain is the first GOP presidential candidate to say the party platform should be changed.
Since announcing his bid for the presidency, McCain has appeared to reteat somewhat from his pro-life position. He had already alienated some pro-life supporters with his hardline stance in favor of some campaign finance reform provisions that would prohibit pro-life groups from being able to speak as freely about candidate's stands on issues and voting records.
In 1996, after a battle with its pro-abortion minority, Republicans adopted a platform that unborn children had "a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed."
The platform went on to call for an amendment to the Constitution that would outlaw all abortions, though it said the party did not favor punishing women who had abortions - only those who carried them out.
The 1980 platform calls for a constitutional amendment to protect fetuses but it also recognizes "differing views on this question among Americans in general and in our own party."
Ann Stone, president of Republicans for Choice, a pro-abortion group, applauded McCain's comments.
Meanwhile the Republicans for Life PAC, a political action committee dedicated to electing pro-life Republicans over pro-abortion GOP candidates, said the real issue of inclusiveness was something the Democrat Party should tackle. "Pro-life Democrats continue to be overtly and covertly ostracized from their party. The same kind of mistreatment Bob Casey suffered in 1992 still occurs," a spokesman said.
Abortion is already emerging as a potent issue in the battle for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000.
Texas Governor Georgue Bush weighed in on McCain's statement. "My attitude is our party is big enough for good people to be able to disagree on the issue. But surely we can agree that there are too many abortions in America," Bush said.
Former American Red Cross President Elizabeth Dole, has said nothing specific about the issue. Her spokesman Ari Fleischer said she would address it at a time of her choosing.
Alan Keyes, a conservative talk radio host who ran for the Republican nomination in 1996 and is considering doing so again in 2000, said McCain was trying to edge the Republican Party away from its pro-life stance. He vowed to fight any change in the platform.
New York Gov. George Pataki, who supports abortion and has been seen as a possible vice presidential nominee, recently called for the party to remove the pro-life plank from its 2000 presidential platform.
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President 2000: McCain Finds Abortion Question a Dilemma
Source: Pro-Life Infonet
Brought to you by: Pro-Life Infonet
Manchester, N.H. January 26, 2000 -- Sen. John McCain said Wednesday it would be a "family decision" to make if his teen-age daughter were contemplating an abortion.
McCain first said that "the final [abortion] decision would be made by Meghan with our advice and counsel." An hour later, he contacted reporters with a clarification: "I misspoke. What I believed I was saying and intended to say is that this is a family decision," McCain said. "The family decision will be made by the family, not by Meghan alone."
Later yet, he said, "It's a family decision, not her decision and that's pro-life," he said. "I would discuss this issue with Cindy (his wife) and Meghan and this would be a private discussion that we would share within our own family and not with anyone else. Obviously, I would encourage her to know that the baby would be brought up in a warm and loving family."
McCain grew testy when reporters continued to press him during the day. "What's the matter with you, sir," he said at one point. "I've answered your question, sir."
He declined to answer when asked what would happen if his daughter became pregnant as the result of rape or incest.
The abortion issue has flared in recent days, as the GOP presidential field moves through the opening round of primaries and caucuses. Last week in Iowa, George W. Bush was caught in a similar bind when he was asked the same question. "I would hope I would be able to evoke enough sympathy from the rape case that I could help comfort her as a friend," he said.
Candidates Steve Forbes, Gary Bauer and Alan Keyes are firmly opposed to abortion, and favor overturning the court's decision.
During an earlier debate, Family Research Council leader Gary Bauer said under circumstances of rape he would pray for his daughter "and explain to her that she couldn't make right the terrible thing that had happened to her by taking the life of her innocent, unborn child."
"My daughter has been raised to believe that that's God's decision, and that it's already been made," Keyes said Wednesday. "And, therefore, I have no fear of what she would do."
Keyes on Wednesday attacked McCain's comments as too weak. He said the Arizona senator could not succeed as the GOP's presidential nominee because he can not articulate an acceptable position on the issue. He said McCain "doesn't have it in his heart and doesn't have it in his mind," and that he "hasn't thought it through."
Abortion is expected to be less important in New Hampshire, where many independents vote in the GOP primary, than it was in the Iowa caucuses. But Bauer indicated he would press Bush in the debate tonight on abortion, as well as China policy and other subjects. "There is so much work to do with George and so little time to do it," Bauer said in Hollis, N.H., today.
If his 15-year-old daughter became pregnant and believed that she wasn't ready to bear a child, would McCain block her from getting an abortion? "No," the Arizona senator.
The issue dogged McCain throughout the day.
Asked whether his comments amounted to a pro-abortion viewpoint, McCain said: "I don't think it's the choice position to say that my daughter and my wife and I will discuss something that is a family matter and that we have to decide."
Pressed on the matter, McCain, clearly irritated, shot back: "I'm not gonna talk about what I'm gonna do with my daughter in the most personal and painful kind of situation that I can imagine outside of a terminal illness."
The Arizona senator has said that he believes that life begins at conception and that he opposes abortion except in cases of rape, incest and when the mother's life is in danger. He pointed out that he has consistently voted against abortion during his 17-year congressional career. McCain also supports parental notification, a law on the books in Arizona where his family lives.
McCain also got caught up in making an incorrect statement about where a pro-life congressional leader stands on abortion.
McCain told a national news program that abortion should be banned except in cases of rape, incest and pregnancy that endangered the life of the mother. Later, on his campaign bus, he said he would seek to change the Republican Party's current, pro-life platform plank on the issue.
McCain also said his position on abortion was consistent with pro-life champion Henry Hyde, an Illinois congressman. However, a staff representative from Henry Hyde's office confirmed that the representative takes only the life of the mother exception and does not favor abortions in cases of rape or incest.
At his first town hall meeting of the day in Sunapee, McCain reiterated his pro-life position, especially after two people in the audience came up to him and said they had received mailings from the National Right to Life Committee saying he was weak on life issues.
One person attending advocated a pro-abortion position.
"We now have the right to have control over our own bodies without the government having anything to say about it. And I want to know what you will do to protect that right that I now have," Pamela Veenstra, a 51-year-old graphic artist, asked, having prefaced her question by expressing concern about the kind of Supreme Court justices McCain would appoint.
"I am pro-life, and I have a position that's the position of my party," McCain responded. "It's based on the belief that life begins at conception."
"I also believe very strongly that we need to work together between pro-life and pro-choice individuals to work on areas on which we agree. We should make adoption easier in America. ... We should improve foster care," McCain said.
McCain added that he would not impose a litmus test of any kind on a Supreme Court nominee but "also would consider their record as far as their adherence to the constitution of the United States."
In August, he surprised his staff and angered pro-life leaders by appearing to suggest that he would oppose repealing Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion.
Under pressure, McCain tried to clarify his views with written statements saying he favors working to overturn the ruling while trying to reduce abortions through adoptions, counseling and other efforts. Whenever McCain is asked about the issue at town hall meetings, he says he wants to reduce the polarizing nature of the debate by encouraging both sides to work together on issues to which they agree, such as improving adoption and foster care systems.