Before Roe: Abortion Policy in the States

6. Party, Discourse, and Policy

6 Party, Discourse, and Policy The pre-Roe story was one of winners and losers. To be sure, groups on both sides of the debate in New York and Pennsylvania encountered party systems that were more or less suited to their needs. But it is no coincidence that the winners in this study, pro-abortion activists in New York and antiabortion forces in Pennsylvania, framed their demands in ways that were in accord with the political conditions they faced, and that played to their respective strengths. The losers conducted campaigns that played into the hands of their opponents, either through poor use of their resources, as in New York, or by employing a discourse and a framing strategy unsuited to the political order, as in Pennsylvania. Indeed, there was nothing inevitable about the outcomes. How exactly did the winners triumph, and how did the losers contribute unintentionally to their dramatic defeats? Winning Ways Parties and Interests The first thing to note is that the campaigns to change the abortion laws in both states occurred in the wake of reform movements. The two states’ party systems and resulting 127 political orders in the mid-1960s were radically different, however, with far more “pluralist links” available to activists in Albany than in Harrisburg.1 Reform Democrats in New York sponsored pro-abortion laws annually from 1966 to 1970, keeping abortion policy on the legislative agenda and legitimizing the idea of reform. The bills became a rallying point that helped pro-abortion activists organize and build bipartisan support. As a result, abortion policy in New York was a function of the political parties. As Table 1 shows, pro-abortion activists defeated the NYCC by securing the votes of legislators from both parties. Equally significant was the intra-party competition within the Democratic party, because it provided the legislative opportunity pro-abortion activists needed to get their bills introduced. It also made them attractive to the reform Democrats , who were seeking new constituencies in their ongoing struggle to gain control of the party from the regulars.2 Without the bi-partisan support of the Reform Democrats and Republicans pro-abortion activists in New York would not have succeeded because the issue was too controversial and the opposition of the NYCC too strong. In Pennsylvania, abortion policy was dictated by the PCC, because by the early 1960s an unreformed party system 128 Chapter Six Table 1. 1970 NewYork LegislatureVote on Abortion Law Repeal Democrats Republicans Senate For 18 13 Against 20 6 Assembly For 46 30 Against 24 49 dominated by machine politics had reasserted itself. Kitschelt (1986) refers to a “cartel of entrenched interests” having control of interest articulation in a closed system; this accurately describes the power of the PCC to defeat abortion reform resoundingly and to pass a highly restrictive abortion law despite a national trend in favor of liberalization. As Table 2 shows, the PCC, like the winning forces in New York, attracted both Democrats and Republicans. The PCC’s margin of victory was far greater, however, which indicated not only that its campaign was superior to the one its opponents waged, but more significantly, showed its ability to transcend the parties, and to pass a policy that served its interests as opposed to the majority’s wishes. Since SB 38, Pennsylvania’s first reform bill, was part of a broader effort to update the penal code rather than a separate party issue, as in New York, once it was killed in committee no organized pro-abortion interests existed to press for its reintroduction. Two years elapsed before another reform bill was filed, which facilitated the PCC’s efforts to keep reform off the legislative agenda and to generate public support for a restrictive abortion policy. In short, although party structures alone did not decide the outcomes in New Party, Discourse, and Policy 129 Table 2. 1972 Pennsylvania LegislatureVote on Restrictive Abortion Policy Democrats Republicans Senate For 20 19 Against 3 4 House For 89 68 Against 15 19 York and Pennsylvania, the political orders that abortion activists in each state encountered affected the degree of access they had to the legislative process and the amount of party support available to them, both of which had a significant effect on the final vote. Discourse In the pre-Roe period, the political struggle was initially a war of words. Although antiabortion forces had the upper hand to begin with, in...