I worked for National Right to Life News in 1980-81, with
Dave Gaetano, when Reagan won and Republicans took control of the Senate. I
spoke with David Stockman after the election; he was a Reagan aide, and became Reagan’s
Director of Office and Management and Budget. Stockman told me (and NRL News
reported) that Reagan would not do much about the social issues any time soon,
because he was going to focus on budget issues. So the work of pro-lifers to
put Reagan in office was set aside, to make way for serious issues.
I covered (and fought) the nomination of Sandra Day O’Connor, who was “personally opposed” to abortion. Henry Hyde told NRL staff – not for publication, but I think that hold on the news has probably expired – that he had met with Reagan before Reagan formally announced the appointment, and had argued against it. Reagan said she was personally opposed. Hyde asked, “Did you ask about Roe v. Wade?” Reagan responded, “Roe v. Wade? What’s that?” So the opportunity to change the Court slipped away.
When it became clear that pro-lifers would not get much from
the Republicans in the Senate and White House, I covered (and helped build) the
second wave of pro-life nonviolence, sit-ins at abortion clinics all across the
country. But that wave did not gather strength until a large number of
pro-lifers gave up on political change as the heart of a pro-life strategy.
The election of Reagan did in fact save the lives of
millions and millions of babies, overseas. I worked with Bill O’Reilly (not the
TV figure), a CPA from Bethesda who had run accounting for the USPS under
Kennedy. O’Reilly found that the World Bank was preparing to build 400 abortion
clinics in Bangladesh – more precisely, to provide “menstrual regulation” in 400
new maternal and child health centers. (Abortion was illegal in Bangladesh, but
menstrual regulation, using a glorified turkey baster, was not excluded.) O’Reilly
was too ignorant to know at you couldn’t lobby the World Bank, so he did it.
(My contribution: I made Bill’s presentation clear and comprehensible, in “The
Deadly Neo-Colonialism.”) And he succeeded. A key (the key, probably) to his
success was that the White House was full of pro-life activists, especially
Anne Higgins in the Office of Correspondence. Anne and others persuaded the Secretary
of Treasury (Donald Regan??) to intervene. The World Bank loan to Bangladesh
was approved, but with a rider attached prohibiting the new MCH centers from
offering turkey-baster services for women whose menses were weeks late. So
although Reagan did not reverse Roe v. Wade, his election set the stage for
saving millions of children in Bangladesh (one in six since 1985??). Nearly all
were Muslim, of course, and probably some of those babies saved by Bill O’Reilly
and his small team (including Fr. Marx at HLI, and Anne Higgins – whose power
and influence depended on Reagan) went on to become mujahideen, killing
Americans.
The population of Bangladesh is about 160 million. Over half
have been born since Bill O’Reilly’s campaign on their behalf.
Reagan’s most solid pro-life success was not planned nor
foreseen. It was overseas, protecting Muslims.