McCain Says He Would Not Use 'Litmus Test' When Appointing Supreme Court Justices

Main Category: Abortion
Also Included In: Women's Health / Gynecology
Article Date: 17 Jun 2008 - 6:00 PDT

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Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on Saturday during a meeting in Virginia said that if elected president, he would not use a "litmus test" when appointing justices to the Supreme Court, the Chicago Tribune reports. According to the Tribune, McCain was responding to questions concerning potential appointments in relation to abortion rights.

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) responded with a press release reminding voters that McCain is an opponent of abortion rights. Obama also told a crowd in Wayne, Pa., that he thinks McCain would appoint Supreme Court justices who would allow states to prohibit abortion (Parsons, Chicago Tribune, 6/15). He added that the court is "just about one justice away" from overturning Roe v. Wade, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports (Fitzgerald, Philadelphia Inquirer, 6/15).

Planned Parenthood Action Fund has given McCain a 0% lifetime voting rating on women's issues. NARAL Pro-Choice America and PPAF have given Obama a 100% rating (Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 6/12).

Keenan Opinion Piece

Although Roe v. Wade and the "bedrock of reproductive rights may not have fully eroded during [President] Bush's time in office, ... another four years with the same anti-choice leadership" under a McCain presidency would mean that "many women won't know what hit them," Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, writes in a related Newark Star-Ledger opinion piece.

According to Keenan, McCain "has gone further than Bush did in either of his campaigns by supporting abortion bans with no exceptions, saying that 'Roe v. Wade is a flawed decision that must be overturned.'" In addition, McCain has voted to "block women's access to birth control, to deny teens accurate information about birth control and condoms, to stop measures that would require insurance companies to cover birth control and to block funds to an organization that provides family planning services -- not abortion -- for the world's poorest women," Keenan writes. Even for people who might not vote on the single issue of abortion, McCain's "positions on family planning, birth control and sex education are too extreme -- too out of touch with moderate and independent voters," Keenan writes.

She concludes that it is McCain's "record, his statements that Roe should be overturned, his support for anti-choice Supreme Court nominees and his 125 out of 130 anti-choice votes in Congress ... that will push pro-choice moderate women voters, regardless of party affiliation, to the pro-choice candidate" (Keenan, Newark Star-Ledger, 6/13).

USA Today Columnist Examines Evangelical Leaders' 'Fear' Over Obama's Nomination

USA Today columnist Daniel Gilgoff, politics editor of Beliefnet.com, in a recent opinion piece examines the "fear" held by some evangelical leaders over the "prospect of Obama's nomination." Obama has a "liberal record" on issues such as abortion rights and gay rights, and a struggle to win some religious voter demographics "undergirded" his losses to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) in the Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia primaries, according to Gilgoff. However, Gilgoff writes that Obama's "unusual potential" to appeal to the "rank-and-file evangelicals and other religious voters who usually back the Christian rights' Republican allies" have evangelical leaders "worried."

Gilgoff writes that another "asset" for Obama among conservative voters is his "past expressions of admiration for the Christian right and its positions." In addition, his "gestures to the faithful" come at a time when evangelical Christians are showing less support to the Republican Party, according to Gilgoff. Tom McClusky, chief lobbyist for the Family Research Council, said, "To a lot of people, Sen. Obama is an unknown suit that talks the 'evangelical talk' without actually saying anything on his opinions or his track record." He added, "In the general election, Sen. Obama speaking 'religion' is going to sound more familiar and natural than Sen. McCain."

A recent "Action Update" from Focus on the Family Action called Obama as "extreme as they come on family issues." In addition, the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has called Obama's position on abortion "Hitlerian," according to Gilgoff. However, McCain is "doing little to advertise" his antiabortion record on the campaign trail while Obama, "though not telling voters what they want to hear on issues such as abortion, is nonetheless speaking to them," Gilgoff writes (Gilgoff, USA Today, 6/16).

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