c. 2004 Religion News Service
WASHINGTON _ Christian anti-abortion groups are planning a Tuesday (Nov. 16) “pray-in” on Capitol Hill to try to prevent Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., from chairing the Senate Judiciary Committee, which will play an important role in determining the next member of the Supreme Court.
The Rev. Pat Mahoney of the Washington-based Christian Defense Coalition, one of the protest sponsors, said he is urging people to pray and to contact Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist insisting that a chairman be chosen who is loyal to President Bush and opposes abortion.
“That man is not Sen. Specter,” said Mahoney.
Mahoney and other Christian conservative leaders are upset about recent remarks Specter made concerning nominations to the Supreme Court. Specter said last week that he thought it would be unlikely for judges with anti-abortion positions to be approved, given the history of Democratic filibusters blocking such appointments.
Specter, who supports abortion rights, says he was just making an observation but some took it as a thinly veiled threat to Bush that he should not consider presenting a high court candidate with a strong anti-abortion record. As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Specter would have control over judicial confirmation proceedings. Traditionally, chairmanship is based on seniority, and Specter, a 24-year-veteran of the Senate, is next in line.
Some religious conservatives fear he will prevent an anti-abortion jurist from becoming the next Supreme Court justice.
“The senator would be wise to study all the exit polls,” said James C. Dobson, chairman of Focus on the Family, a Colorado-based conservative Christian organization. “The people who put President Bush back in the White House and expanded the Republican majority in the Senate weren’t voting for a party _ they were voting for candidates who share their pro-family values.”
In an electronic message sent to its members, Focus on the Family urged its members to contact Senate Republicans to block Specter’s nomination. The message declared, “Sen. Specter’s pro-abortion views make him a poor choice to oversee the process of getting President Bush’s judicial nominees approved.”
But not all religious conservatives are against Specter. Religious broadcaster and Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson said on “The 700 Club,” his television show, that he supports Specter and that his comments have been taken out of context.
Specter also claims the political firestorm is based on a misunderstanding.
“To resolve any concern that I would block pro-life judicial nominees, take a look at my record,” wrote Specter in a Nov. 10 Wall Street Journal opinion piece. “I have consistently opposed any litmus test. I have backed that up by my voting to confirm pro-life nominees including Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Justice Antonin Scalia, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor and Justice Anthony Kennedy. I led the fight to confirm Justice Clarence Thomas, which almost cost me my Senate seat in 1992.”
Specter argued in his Wall Street Journal article that, “as the only pro-choice Republican on the Judiciary Committee,” he would be in a good position to negotiate with Democrats in getting the president’s nominees confirmed.
Specter led the fight against President Reagan’s nomination of conservative jurist Robert Bork to the U.S. Supreme Court and helped block a 1985 conservative appointment, Jeff Sessions, to a federal judgeship. Specter said both candidates were too extreme on civil rights issues.
John Green, an expert on religion and politics and the director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron, said the protest shows that “Christian conservatives have a very clear agenda” and “they want to do everything they can to advance their agenda.”
“This type of activity is very likely to continue in the future.”
Mahoney said the Tuesday protest will be held in front of the Dirksen Senate Building and has the backing of 11 other groups representing religious conservatives.
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