The Casey Approach – It’s "Both/And," Baby!

There is a long-running debate about whether a “demand side” or “supply side” approach is the best way to bringing down the abortion rate. Myself, I favor both – more support for moms and kids and restrictions on abortion when and where moral consensus exists (e.g. parental notification laws, PBA ban, etc.). And an ongoing effort to expand that moral consensus so that every baby is “welcomed in life and protected in law” as they say. This is not an either/or kind of issue.

A good model here is the late Bob Casey, two-term governor of the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Casey was not a “conservative Democrat” in the Zell Miller mold, but a progressive populist committed to the traditional Democrat position that government has a responsibility to protect the most vulnerable. Casey acted on this by, among other things, pushing for progressive tax reform, creating school-based child care programs for teen parents, and signing into law a program providing health insurance for poor children who were ineligible for Medicaid (see here).

Casey took this concern for the most vulnerable to what he thought was its logical conclusion. He asked “Since when does America abandon in despair an entire class of people, the most defenseless, innocent, and vulnerable members of the human family? How can we justify writing off the unborn child in a country which prides itself on leaving no one out and no one behind?”

On a related note, New Zealander (incidentally, is “Kiwi” considered a disparaging term by NZers?) John at Home, Throne & Altar questions the efficacy of a sex-ed/contraception/cradle-to-grave-socialism approach to reducing abortions.