For all practical purposes a John McCain presidency will signal the eventual end of abortion rights in America. During both the primary and general election seasons there has been much discussion about how McCain is viewed as “suspect” among social conservatives. Of the many issues that social conservatives espouse, Abortion is definitely the cornerstone and McCain, during his long tenure in Washington, has given Pro-Life advocates much pause for concern.

Just like his waffling on Civil Rights, McCain has shown a penchant for “flip-flopping” on abortion also. Over the past ten years McCain has vacillated on the specifics of abortion while generally maintaining an aversion to its practice.

In an Associated Press article written by Ron Fournier in August of 1999 McCain, prior to his first run for the presidency in 2000, said:

“I’d love to see a point where Roe vs. Wade is irrelevant, and could be repealed because abortion is no longer necessary. But certainly in the short term, or even the long term, I would not support repeal of Roe vs. Wade, which would then force women in America to [undergo] illegal and dangerous operations.”

The following year, During a GOP debate in Manchester, New Hampshire in January of 2000, then GOP presidential candidate Alan Keyes chided McCain for previous comments that he would “convene a family conference” and “leave the decision up to her” if his daughter was ever in need of an abortion.

Later that month, during a Meet the Press interview, McCain firmly stated that he was against abortion with the exception “rape, incest and the life of the mother.” In the same interview he suggested that he would support “prosecuting doctors that perform abortions, not the women who seek them.”

Further complicating an understanding of McCain’s true belief on abortion is his support for fetal tissue research, a position that places him at odds with a Pro-Life movement that is against the use of aborted fetuses for scientific research.

While abortion has not been the hottest issue of this years’ election, it is still important to note that the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-choice advocacy group that charts abortion statistics, has reported that as of 2005 abortions had “declined from approximately 1.31 million to 1.21 million.” The same report suggested that the number of abortion providers had “dropped by 2%” and that “87 % of all US counties lacked an abortion provider.” With such statistics it is apparent that the focus on pregnancy prevention and counseling that began to flourish under the Clinton administration, and has continued with an even greater focus on counseling and adoption under Bush, has worked.

Still, social conservatives will not rest until abortion is made completely illegal. Accordingly, it is easy to understand why Conservatives remain skeptical about whether McCain is truly a Pro-Life candidate.

This particular weakness was one of the main reasons behind McCain’s selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin to serve as his running mate. Palin, who claims to be a devout Christian, has gone on record to state that she is personally opposed to abortion even in the case of rape or incest. During her brief tenure as Alaska governor she has yet to use her personal beliefs as a bully pulpit for this issue, but on a grander stage, it is obvious that her presence as vice president would help a President McCain in the vetting and eventual nomination of conservative Federal justices and lower court judges.

If elected, McCain/Palin will have an opportunity to select as few as two and as many as four Supreme Court justices over an eight-year period. If that occurs, we can expect the court to take a hard right turn, a shift that will remain in effect for at least thirty or forty years as the likely nominees would be young conservatives between the ages of forty and fifty years old.

If that occurs, I strongly suspect that upon McCain’s election several Republican state court legislatures will immediately pass laws to either outlaw or severely restrict abortion. Eventually, legal challenges to such law’s will be heard and upheld by a Conservative Supreme Court, which will eliminate the right to choose as contemplated within Roe vs. Wade.

What confuses me is how a conservative movement that advocates making government smaller while keeping government from impeding business and individual rights, would be so willing to dictate a woman’s decision on this very private issue. Leading these modern “Pharisees” are men and women who claim to be doing God’s work that can provide no Biblical basis for the philosophical underpinning of the Pro-Life movement, which is that “life begins at conception.”

While the Bible certainly and clearly opposes “fornication”, there is no discussion of one of the occasional by-products of fornication---“unintended pregnancies.” Instead of taking a position of praying for those women and men facing such an awesome decision while providing the counseling to make them rare, these individuals choose to politicize an issue under the banner of “thus said the Lord” with no proof that the Lord ever uttered one word about or inspired any individual to write about abortion.

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