Why the Stupak Amendment on Obamacare Was the Right Strategy

Some are arguing that the Stupak Amendment allowed H.R. 3962, Obamacare, to pass and so the right strategy would have been to kill the Stupak amendment and thus kill the bill altogether.    Some groups urged Republicans to vote “present” on the Stupak Amendment to avoid having a recorded vote in favor of abortion funding, so their votes would not be counted and the amendment would fail.   Here are the reasons why this strategy was flawed and why support for the Stupak Amendment was the right strategy:

• The most important reason is the moral one — allowing a pro-abortion bill which would result in federal funding of abortion to advance un-amended would cynically have allowed political goals to take precedent over saving the lives of unborn children.
• The bill would likely have passed anyway, without the Stupak Amendment.  Stupak and his 39 pro-life colleagues are not all Blue Dogs — many of them support H.R. 3962.    Stupak’s argument all along was to allow a vote on his amendment and he succeeded.  If the Republicans had deserted Stupak after working with him for months to procure a vote, the pro-life Democrats likely would have voted their conscience on the Stupak Amendment, and then voted for the bill, giving Speaker Pelosi and the pro-aborts a huge victory.
• If the House had not passed the Stupak Amendment, the chances would be even slimmer that the Senate would adopt similar language.

In the end, only Republican John Shadegg (R-Az) voted “present.”   All other House Republicans honored their commitment to the unborn and to Rep. Stupak.  It was the right thing to do and the right strategy.

The Weekly Standard summed it up nicely in an article that can be read here.

Barbara Lyons