THE EROSION STRATEGY

AS CLINTON'S NOMINEE IS DEFEATED, ABORTION FOES PURSUE A PLAN TO REVERSE THE GAINS OF THEIR RIVALS

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The 1994 election that put the Republicans back in power on Capitol Hill also brought big gains for the antiabortion movement--at least 35 seats in the House and five in the Senate. They can now claim a majority in each house on many abortion-related questions. And at least five of the most ardent of the newly elected abortion foes are women, blurring the battle lines of gender for the first time. "Their agenda is very clear. First, Newt Gingrich's hundred days; now, it's Pat Robertson's hundred days," said Democrat Nita Lowey of New York, who heads the House women's caucus. "We don't have the votes to stop any of this in the House."

Even so, the antiabortion forces are picking their shots carefully and, the other side concedes, shrewdly. Rather than trying to overturn Roe v. Wade entirely, they are focusing on more narrow questions that tap into the nation's deep ambivalence about abortion. "We are not trying to come in and suddenly make radical changes," said freshman Republican Enid Greene Waldholtz of Utah. "We're trying to address the legitimate concerns of people who think the pendulum has swung too far." Says Ralph Reed, executive director of the Christian Coalition, whose Contract with the American Family is the blueprint for much of the legislation: "We don't want to overplay our hand with a pro-life Congress the way the pro-abortion people overplayed their hand."

Abortion foes expect a string of relatively easy victories this summer on the question of taxpayer-subsidized abortions. Not only do they have public opinion on their side, but they can also insert these provisions into major spending bills that are less likely to face either a filibuster in the Senate or a veto by President Clinton.

Two weeks ago, the House approved appropriations legislation that prevents women in the armed forces and their dependents from obtaining abortions at military hospitals overseas, even if they pay for them. In jeopardy too are Medicaid funds that now may be used to provide abortions to poor women who suffer rape and incest, as well as the use of federal family-planning money to provide abortion counseling. Antiabortion legislators will also attempt to restore a series of prohibitions that Clinton overturned in his first week in office--among them, bans on fetal-tissue research and importation of RU-486, the French abortion-inducing drug. Clinton vetoes are expected, but, says Reed, some of the legislation is meant to be "veto bait," couched in relatively reasonable terms to give the impression that Clinton's abortion stance is radical.

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