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The Abortion Controversy and Party Politics By Msgr. George G. Higgins The Yard Stick June 5, 2000  During my 60 years in Washington as a social-action bureaucrat and close observer of public affairs, I have scrupulously refrained from getting involved in any way in partisan politics. I have been on Capitol Hill no more than a half dozen times and then only to testify, by invitation, before congressional committees on pending socio-economic legislation. I never have lobbied a congressman or senator either in person or in writing. In fact, I have not visited or contacted the Hill for any purpose in roughly 40 years. As a columnist for more than 50 years I have consistently followed the same policy of political nonpartisanship.  Recently, however, I have been tempted to side politically on the abortion controversy. When I learned a few weeks ago that former Gov. Robert Casey of Pennsylvania had died, I was on the verge of speaking out publicly against the Democratic Party for having denied Casey his well-deserved right to address its last convention solely because he had the integrity to challenge the party's pro-abortion plank.  Before I could get around to doing so, however, syndicated columnist Mark Shields wrote an excellent column defending the governor and saying what I thought needed to be said in criticism of the party. So I let the matter drop.  I continue to be aggrieved, however, by the fact that so many self-styled "liberals" (in both parties, but mainly in the Democratic Party) feel constrained to support the so-called pro-choice position on abortion and to use it as a political litmus test. One of my favorite magazines, The American Prospect, jumped on the pro-choice bandwagon in its June 5 issue with an article by Wendy Kaminer, "Abortion and Autonomy." I don't know what party Kaminer belongs to, but the magazine, while politically independent, leans toward the Democratic Party. I decided to complain to the editors in a letter which read as follows:  "Wendy Kaminer's article ('Abortion and Autonomy,' June 5) says that Elizabeth Cady Stanton's essay, 'The Solitude of Self,' should guide the pro-choice movement. Why? Because 'Stanton, a mother of seven and political organizer who spent most of her life in a crowd, stressed the 'individuality of the human soul.' That could be said of or by every pro-life advocate I have ever met, but, whatever of that, it's a stretch to say that Stanton's essay, selectively quoted by Kaminer, should guide the pro-choice movement.  "Kaminer failed to inform her readers that Stanton described abortion as 'a crying evil.' She also failed to note that Stanton's equally famous 19th-century proponent of women's rights, Susan B. Anthony, had this to say about abortion: 'The woman is awfully guilty who commits the deed. It will burden her conscience in life, it will burden her soul in death.' I take it that Kaminer would vehemently disagree with Susan B. Anthony in this regard, but I trust that she would be willing to stipulate that Susan B. Anthony believed in the individuality of the human soul.  "I am not sure that I understand why The American Prospect, which normally specializes in socio-economic issues, felt constrained to take sides in the abortion controversy, but, having done so, it is under some obligation to require its pro-choice contributors to cite the historical record accurately and in full context. In my opinion, the editors failed to meet this obligation in the case of the Kaminer article."  I don't know why The American Prospect, which concentrates almost exclusively on socio-economic issues, got involved in the abortion controversy. Sadly, the magazine capitulated and aligned itself with the pro-choice crowd without giving the other side a hearing.     Papal Social Encyclicals   Other Catholic Social Teachings General Articles of Interest  Catholic Worker Connection Msgr. George Higgins  Home Page E-Mail: Fr. Sinclair Oubre