Posted on 01/18/2007 9:27:26 AM PST by Dark Skies
As pro-lifers prepare to mark Monday’s 34th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Roe vs. Wade decision, many wonder whether they could support former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani for president despite his pro-choice views. While some of Giuliani’s statements on abortion make pro-lifers fret, they should find his record surprisingly reassuring.
“I don’t like abortion,” Giuliani said in South Carolina’s The State newspaper last November 21. “I don’t think abortion is a good thing. I think we ought to find some alternative to abortion, and that there ought to be as few as possible.”
Nevertheless, Giuliani’s pro-life critics point to his April 5, 2001 address to the National Abortion Rights Action League’s “Champions of Choice” luncheon in Manhattan.
“As a Republican who supports a woman’s right to choose, it is particularly an honor to be here,” Giuliani said. He added: “The government shouldn’t dictate that choice by making it a crime or making it illegal.”
“I have a daughter now,” Giuliani told TV’s Phil Donahue during his unsuccessful 1989 mayoral campaign. Giuliani continued: “I would give my personal advice, my religious and moral views…I would help her with taking care of the baby. But if the ultimate choice of the woman -- my daughter or any other woman -- would be that in this particular circumstance, to have an abortion, I’d support that. I’d give my daughter the money for it.”
But did Giuliani’s mayoral deeds match such words?
According to the state Office of Vital Statistics, total abortions performed in New York City between 1993 (just before Giuliani arrived) and 2001 (as he departed) fell from 103,997 to 86,466 -- a 16.86 percent decrease. This upended a 10.32 percent increase compared to eight years before Giuliani, when 1985 witnessed 94,270 abortions.
What about Medicaid-financed abortions? Under Giuliani, such taxpayer-funded feticides dropped 22.85 percent, from 45,006 in 1993 to 34,722 in 2001.
The abortion ratio also slid from 890 terminations per 1,000 live births in 1993 to 767 in 2001, a 13.82 percent tail-off. This far outpaced the 2.84 percent reduction from 1985’s ratio of 916 to 1993’s 890. While abortions remained far more common in Gotham than across America (2001’s U.S. abortion ratio was 246), they diminished during Giuliani’s tenure, as they did nationally.
Giuliani essentially verbalized his pro-choice beliefs while avoiding policies that would have impeded abortion’s generally downward trajectory.
New York pro-lifers concede that Giuliani never attempted anything like what current Mayor Michael Bloomberg promulgated in July 2002. Eight city-run hospitals added abortion instruction to the training expected of their OB-GYN medical residents. Only those with moral objections may refuse this requirement.
Giuliani could have issued such rules, but never did.
Interestingly enough, after Giuliani left, Medicaid abortions under Bloomberg increased 5.19 percent from 34,722 in 2001 to 36,523 in 2003.
Asked if he could cite any Giuliani initiative that advanced abortion, New York State Conservative Party Chairman Mike Long told me, “I don’t remember, and I don’t think so.” He added: “I never remember seeing him promote the issue, to my knowledge.”
“I like him a lot -- although he doesn’t share my particular point of view on social issues,” televangelist Pat Robertson said May 1, 2005 on ABC’s “This Week.” “He did a super job running the city of New York and I think he’d make a good president.”
If Giuliani can sway Pat Robertson, can he attract other pro-lifers? Short of dizzying himself and others with a 180-degree reversal from a pro-choice to a pro-life posture, Giuliani should embrace parental-notification rules, so minors who seek abortions need their folks’ permission, as they now do for ear piercing. He should oppose partial-birth abortion, which even Democrats such as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and liberal stalwart Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont have voted to prohibit.
Similarly, Giuliani should propose that Uncle Sam exit embryonic-stem-cell research laboratories and instead let drug companies -- not government -- finance such embryocidal experiments, if they must. He also could pledge to nominate constitutionalist judges skeptical of penumbras emanating outside Planned Parenthood clinics.
And, of course, Rudolph W. Giuliani should remind Republican primary voters that on his watch, total abortions, taxpayer-funded Medicaid abortions, and the abortion ratio all went the right way: down.
Mr. Murdock, a New York-based commentator to HUMAN EVENTS, is a columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service and a media fellow with the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University.
I didn't want to name call - you see we pro-Rudy people (yourself included) try to be civil!
Duncan Hunter can't win the general election! Electability has to be a vital part of the equation when choosing the GOP nominee.
"I can't point you to a poll (short on time today) but I can tell you from anecdotal evidence that a large number of people do believe that almost no one has an abortion just because the baby is inconvenient."
See #88.
That is easy. Hillary has a (D) and Rudy has a (R).
As I said earlier, only Ron Paul (and Hagel if he enters) are GOP candidates opposed to the Iraq War. So IMO that will not be the deciding issue in the primaries, just the general election.
So show me where a pro-abort, pro-gun control East Coast liberal pubbie has won the nomination in recent history.
Because I'm of the opinion that even one is way too many.
Heartened? Give me a break! That's like expecting Jews to be "heartened" because Hitler would have preferred other solutions to the "final solution". I will actively campaign against anyone with a even a hint of a pro-abortion/murder stance.
Though I would have not done so in his shoes, just remember that even most moral people are going to see the horror he was married to and cut him slack.
I appreciate what you are saying but I think it as important as anything else we face. If our government will not protect the most basic of rights (life) then it is useless and we are opening up for anarchy.
I wonder how long it will take Rudy's wife number 4 to kick him out of the White House?
it will be interesting to see which candidates,Rudi or whoever, turn themselves into pretzels to show how centrist they are...just like Obabma...
the gop needs to put someone up that hasn't tried to realign themselves within at least the past 8 years. we need a real person to get behind...not some perceived "winnable" candidate
Too many people on here put social issues as their #1 priority when electing a President and because of that have thrown out others who might be a much better President.
Jimmy Carter said he sinned when he lusted for a woman in his heart and equated it to having an affair which you could say he was espousing social conservative speak. Horrible President -- didn't have a clue what it took to be a strong President.
I help elect my Congressman and two Senators to be my voice in Congress to deal with social issues that might come up -- I don't elect a President to deal with social issues but to deal in today's environment with the War on Terror and insuring a strong defense to be able to fight that war.
No President has the power to take away guns, stop abortions, etc. The Congress has that power and some social conservatives didn't get the message that throwing a tantrum and not voting to teach Republicans a lesson now has this Country in trouble with the DemocRATs in charge who can make a difference on social issues for the negative.
Nevertheless, Giuliani’s pro-life critics point to his April 5, 2001 address to the National Abortion Rights Action League’s “Champions of Choice” luncheon in Manhattan.
“As a Republican who supports a woman’s right to choose, it is particularly an honor to be here,” Giuliani said. He added: “The government shouldn’t dictate that choice by making it a crime or making it illegal.”
These three statements appear to offer a fair and balanced overview of Giuliani's views on this issue. They seem to be the views of someone who does not appreciate the seriousness of the act of abortion, not only on the millions of children who will never be, but on the psyche of the millions of would-be mothers who will be scarred for life by this irreversible choice.
Regarding the last statement, considering that abortion DOES end a human life (unless one subscribes to the "Poof! paradigm"), "that choice" could be any act no matter how egregious - robbing, murder, abuse, etc.
Agreed. And having been through a few rough points in my marriage to where I had to crash at a cousin's house, I don't have an issue with him sacking out at a friend's house. Nor dressing up in drag.
I am opposed to Rudy on several key issues. I would hope the discussion can stay at that level.
Dear Antoninus,
"'Well I guess this quote from Rudy means nothing at all to you:'
"Why should it? The entire premise of this article is to get conservatives to believe a lie--that Rudy Giuliani is pro-life."
As well, Mr. Giuliani has not only praised Mr. Roberts, Mr. Alito, and Mr. Scalia, but has singled out for praise as a Supreme Court justice Mrs. Ginsburg.
Why wouldn't he? He believes that the "right" to abortion is in the Constitution. He believes that significant gun control is constitutional. He believes that homosexuals have a "right" to "civil unions."
Thus, for him, a "strict constructionist" could very well be someone who supports Roe, gun control, and the homosexual agenda.
sitetest
How many lives has the WOT taken? How many did Vietnam take?
Now, how many lives has abortion taken and scarred?
Are you beginning to see WHY abortion is so important as an issue?
Electability in the general election, not the primaries.
He seems to have found the right one now. She is with him when he travels and was there for him when he had cancer (something Donna Hanover never did) and from what I've seen he seems to genuinely love this woman. Sometimes it takes a few tries before you hit the right one. Not everyone is lucky and finds the right one on the first shot.
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