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Subject: Abortion Rights Supporters Claim Election Gains; Exit Polls Indicate That a
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 92 05:41:19 EST
Message-ID: <38.1992Nov9.054120@AmeriCast.com>

Abortion Rights Supporters Claim Election Gains; Exit Polls Indi-
cate That a Majority of Voters Favor Access, but With Some
Restrictions<By E. J. Dionne Jr.<Washington Post Staff Writer=

Supporters of abortion rights claimed large gains from the 1992
elections, the most important being the victory of President-
elect  Clinton, who is committed to reversing many of President
Bush's antiabortion executive orders and vetoes and to appointing
Supreme Court justices who would keep abortion legal.

Abortion rights backers also picked up strength in the House of
Representatives, both sides in the controversy agree.

The National Abortion Rights Action League estimated a net gain
of 11 House seats for its side, according to Loretta Ucelli, the
group's communications director. Douglas Johnson, legislative
director for the National Right to Life Committee, said this es-
timate was "pretty close to the mark." There was little change in
the Senate.

Nevertheless, exit polls show there is still ambivalence about
abortion in this year's electorate.

These polls suggested that supporters of unlimited access to
abortion vastly outnumber those who <would make abortion illegal
in all cases. But the polls also found that abortion foes contin-
ue to be more likely than abortion rights supporters to say that
they based their voting decision on the abortion issue.  And the
polls showed that most Americans favor at least some restrictions
on abortion.

These results came at the end of a campaign in which the abortion
issue took a back seat to other concerns, notably worries about
the economy.  As in the 1990 midterm elections, predictions that
the abortion issue would be a central voting concern proved mis-
guided. But partisans on both sides of the issue insisted that it
had important secondary effects.

While Clinton and Bush profited from energetic organizing by ac-
tivists on both sides of the abortion issue, each campaign sought
to stake out at least some middle ground.  Bush repeatedly
described his stand as "pro-life," but Vice President Quayle
seemed to be staking out a new Republican position emphasizing
restrictions on abortion rather than outright prohibition.

When asked on the campaign trail whether he thought abortion
should be illegal, Quayle usually sidestepped the question by
saying he was sympathetic to restrictions such as requiring that
parents of minors seeking abortion give their consent - or at
least be notified - before an abortion could be performed.

Many Republicans, including conservatives who oppose abortion,
said privately after the election that the party needed to seek
some middle ground on the issue because voters appear reluctant
to make abortion entirely illegal.

Clinton took many stands in line with positions of the abortion
rights movement, including supporting the Freedom of Choice Act,
which would codify the right to an abortion into federal law. He
also said he would lift the "gag rule" that prohibits non-
physicians at federally financed family planning clinics from
providing advice about abortions.

But Clinton also followed the middle ground by emphasizing his
support for notifying the parents of minors who seek abortions,
except for those who have reason to fear their parents' reaction.
Clinton has been described by some aides as determined to depo-
larize the abortion debate by supporting parental notification
and emphasizing programs to promote adoptions and to prevent
unwanted pregnancies.

The middle ground is clearly a popular place to stand, according
to a nationwide exit poll of about 15,000 voters conducted by
Voter Research & Surveys for major news organizations.

The poll found that 34 percent of voters surveyed thought abor-
tion should be "always legal" and 9 percent thought it should be
"always illegal." In the middle were 30 percent who said abortion
should be "mostly legal" and 23 percent who said it should be
"mostly illegal."

Seen in one light, the country is about 2-to-1 "pro-choice," if
those who say abortion should be "always" or "mostly" legal are
counted together. Seen in another light, the vast majority of
Americans favor at least some restrictions on abortion, although
many in this majority appear to favor keeping such restrictions
to a minimum.

As for the power of the abortion issue to move votes, the exit
polling produced ambiguous results.

On the one hand, 12 percent of the voters surveyed said that
abortion was one of two issues that determined their vote for
president; this group strongly backed Bush, giving him 56 per-
cent, compared with 36 percent for Clinton and 8 percent for in-
dependent Ross Perot. Johnson of the National Right to Life Com-
mittee used these figures to argue that voters most concerned
about abortion are inclined to oppose it. He estimated that
Bush's antiabortion stance produced a net gain of 3 percentage
points for the Republican.

But the exit poll also gave voters another list of issues and
asked if any of them had been "very important" in determining
their vote. The poll found that 32 percent said future Supreme
Court appointments were "very important" to their vote; this
group voted 50 percent for Clinton, 39 percent for Bush and 11
percent for Perot. This measure suggested that Clinton was helped
by his relative liberalism on constitutional issues, including
abortion.

The abortion issue failed to produce the pro-Clinton surge among
Republican women that abortion rights supporters had predicted.
Clinton got 10 percent among Republican men and exactly the same
among Republican women, according to the exit poll. On the other
hand, 49 percent of female college graduates, who tend to be sup-
portive of abortion rights, voted for Clinton, while male college
graduates gave the Democrat 40 percent of their votes.<05:00 11-
09C9999-----

Copyright 1992, The Washington Post.  This story is from the
Washington Post's Capitol Edition On-Line and is not to be ar-
chived or redistributed.

For more information, send-email to American Cybercasting Cor-
poration (usa@AmeriCast.COM)