November Senate elections to decide their fate

For Some Babies, It's Now or Never

By Carol Tobias
NRL PAC Director

Remember the exhilaration of the 2000 elections? Remember how, after four years of pro-abortion Bill Clinton, we worked so hard to elect a pro-life president, only to be told by the media that Al Gore had "won" Florida, and probably with it, the presidency?

Well, a very long night ensued, followed by over a month of legal wrangling, until, finally, pro-lifer George Bush was definitively declared the winner.

Most of the drama seemed to occur in those hours and days after Election Day. But the real work, what really won the election, was done by thousands of volunteers and contributors over many weeks and months before the election.

And in the end, the race was so close, that had any of them not done their part, pro-abortion Al Gore might now be president.

We Face Another 2000

They say it doesn't get any closer than the 2000 election for president and maybe it doesn't. But take a look at how close the 2002 Senate elections are shaping up to be. The Washington political newsletter Hotline does a survey of state polls which, taken together, project who is likely to win control of the U.S. Senate and House.

The Democrats currently control the U.S. Senate by a single seat -- 51 to 49. This gives pro-abortion senators the chairs of key committees. Worse, it makes pro-abortion Senator Tom Daschle (D- SD) the Majority Leader, with great powers to block or to expedite legislation.

Throughout 2001 and 2002, the House of Representatives has passed numerous pro-life measures that President Bush supports, including a ban on human cloning, the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, and the Child Custody Protection Act. But Daschle, using his majority leader powers, has so far blocked all of them from even coming to a vote.

The Republicans control the House of Representatives by a razor- thin margin of six seats (out of 435). All of the top leadership of the House Republicans are pro-life, as are most of key committee chairmen, which has made possible the approval of numerous pro-life bills and amendments.

Although dozens of House Democrats regularly vote pro-life, nearly all of the most senior Democrats--those who hold leadership posts--are pro-abortion.

As we go to press, the latest Hotline state-by-state surveys show the question of who will be in the Senate leadership to be exactly tied, at 49 seats apiece, with two races impossible to call because they are so close.

That means a tied election right now may hold the fate of partial-birth abortion legislation, or the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, or the cloning of human embryos.

A U.S. Senate with pro-life leadership is critical to the fate of unborn children in this country.... If we do not help now, Tom Daschle and his friends at Planned Parenthood and NARAL will win. It's that simple.

Hotline's track record? In September 2000, it successfully predicted the outcome of the presidential election down to the last electoral vote! It projected that if Bush were to win the then toss-up states of Florida, New Hampshire, Louisiana, and Missouri, he would win the presidency by 271-167 electoral votes. Except for one Gore elector who cast a protest vote, that turned out to be the exact margin!

What Can I Do?

Just as the Bush-Gore race wasn't really decided in the last hours of the campaign, neither will this year's crucial Senate and House races. Please get active now to help insure we are within striking distance in the last weeks of October and the first week of November.

If we wait until then, it will be too late, and Tom Daschle and his pro-abortion friends at Planned Parenthood, NARAL, and NOW, not to mention at all the abortion clinics, will win. It's that simple.

If you can help pro-life volunteers in your area with literature drops, phone calls, or mailings, please do so. You can help the campaigns of pro-life U.S. Senate candidates, write letters to the editor in favor of those candidates, donate to state and National Right to Life PACs, educate your neighbors, and speak up about what's at stake.

Better yet, do several of these things. That's how we win.

And we must win. The cost of defeat for the babies is just too high.

The election of 2000 started a political revolution in our country that I think history will see much more clearly. So much has happened since then. President Bush has made it clear he wants to build a "culture of life" in this country, one in which " every child is welcomed in life, and protected in law."

We started the agenda with all our work in the months leading up to the 2000 elections. But for over a year, Sen. Tom Daschle and his pro-abortion allies in the Senate have blocked the pro-life agenda, blocked what we worked so hard in the year 2000 to start.

Let's finish the job -- the movement needs your help now, not just on Election Day, November 5. Let's truly make this a political revolution the babies will thank us for.