Catholic League
for Religious and Civil Rights
1011 First Avenue
New York, New York 10022
Phone: (212)371-3191 Fax (212)371-3394

RELEASE DATE: January 24, 1997
ATTN: News Editor
CONTACT: William A. Donohue, Ph.D., President, Catholic League

GORE MAKES VEILED ATTACK ON CATHOLIC CHURCH

On January 22, the 24th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, Vice
President Al Gore spoke before the National Abortion and
Reproductive Rights Action League (NARAL) delivering a decidedly
pro-choice speech. Labeling the pro-life side "anti-choice,"
Gore insinuated that the Catholic Church was responsible for the
large volume of abortions in the U.S.

Gore claimed that those who believe that "family planning, in the
form of birth control and even the giving of information about
birth control, is morally wrong" were culpable for driving up the
abortion rate. Referring to this group, Gore said, "If they were
willing to abandon that aspect of their common front then there
would be much that we could all do together to make abortions
rare." He left little doubt that it was those Catholics who
followed the teachings of the Church on family planning that were
responsible for the high abortion rate.

Catholic League president William Donohue issued the following
remarks today:

"Vice President Gore should have the integrity to simply finger
the Catholic Church as the reason why abortions are not rare.
Instead, he prefers to assign culpability in an oblique manner.
This is regrettable because it eschews a much needed national
debate: is it the teachings of the Catholic Church that accounts
for the high abortion rate or is it the edicts of the Clinton
Administration? Given the fact that Gore, like President
Clinton, supports partial-birth abortions, it is difficult to
understand what abortions he might oppose.

"There is another problem with Gore's speech. Both he and
Hillary Clinton addressed an organization that was founded on
anti-Catholicism. In its early days, NARAL, as one of its
founders Dr. Bernard Nathanson has said, attacked [the Roman
Catholic Church] at every opportunity. Our favorite tack was to
blame the church for the death of every woman from a botched
abortion.' As such, it is outrageous that the Vice President and
the First Lady would dignify such an audience with their
presence."


The Catholic League is the nation's largest Catholic Civil Rights
organization. It defends individual Catholics and the
institutional Church from defamation and discrimination.

Subject: remarks of First Lady at Abortion Rights luncheon 1/22

THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
_________________________________________________________________
Internal Transcript January 22, 1997

REMARKS BY THE FIRST LADY
AT NATIONAL ABORTION RIGHTS
ACTION LEAGUE LUNCHEON

MRS. CLINTON: I am pleased to be here with all of
you. And I know that it took a little longer to get into the
room than usual, but let me reassure you about the events of this
morning. We do not know what the facts are, but law enforcement,
as the President said this morning, is working hard to get the
bottom of it, and it does not, at least so far as we know at this
time, appear to be anything serious that should concern us.

I am very pleased to be here for a number of
reasons. One is to join all of you in honoring Robin Chandler
Duke. We will hear more about her as the program goes on. But I
wanted to thank her publicly for her tireless work on behalf of
family planning here at home and particularly internationally, on
her advocacy of safe motherhood and other issues critical to
women, children and families. She has always understood that
these are not marginal concerns. They relate to political and
economic progress, human rights, and peace and prosperity here in
our country and around the world.

So I wanted to raise my voice with all of yours in
commending her for all of her work in raising awareness about
family planning and her many other contributions that she has
already made and that I know she will continue to make into the
future. (Applause.)

I also wanted to come and recognize and thank my
friend, Nancy Rubin, for her energy, her wisdom and all of her
efforts on behalf of causes relating to women and families. She
is a clear and articulate voice for women's rights around the
world and has worked to strengthen education, economic
opportunities, legal protections and political rights, and has
helped from one corner of the world to the next to bring women's
issues to the forefront of international and national concerns.
(Applause.)

And I know that I speak for all of us and for many
others who are not here in thanking Kate Michelman for over a
decade of service leading this organization and doing so much to
promote and protect a women's right to choose. It has not been
an easy mission. And she has continued to speak up and speak out
even in difficult times. And, Kate, we want to thank you for
that. (Applause).

I'm delighted that the Vice President and Tipper
Gore will be here shortly, representing the administration, and
that both of them will address you. I literally am dropping in,
wanting to be here today, but I have a previous engagement and
have to be New York this evening, I think--I lose track of where
I am and where I'm going and where I'll be. (Laughter.)

But I wanted to lend my voice to the Vice
President's and Tipper's and to all of yours in thanking you for
your work. And particularly, I wanted to thank the members of
Congress who are here and other elected officials for remaining
steadfast in their support of a woman's right to choose.

This is never an easy issue, and anyone who thinks
they have the ultimate truth on it is always going to be wrong.
This is a very hard issue. And in the next years, I hope that we
will be able to find ways of increasing dialogue, in working
together with people of good faith who do not share extremism as
their rallying cry, to try to understand how we can continue the
progress that has been made in the last four years in decreasing
the number of abortions, decreasing teen pregnancy, in working to
give women opportunities to make the choices that are best for
them and their families.

And I have no illusions about the difficulty of
that. But I also have no illusions that there is any other route
to take. This is an issue that will be with us because of the
strong feelings. And I think that my husband's formulation of it
years ago is still the right one, that abortion should be legal,
safe and rare. We have worked hard in the last--(applause)--in
the last four years to maintain legality and safety and to begin
to put into place attitudes and values and policies that are
beginning to work to make abortion rare.

But that will mean we also must speak out on behalf
of family planning here and around the world--(applause)--on
behalf of educational opportunities for young women and young men
so they know they have better choices and that they should
postpone childbearing or even confronting the issue of abortion.
It means that we have to have good, comprehensive health care
services available to all people in our country so that they have
access to the same information that those of us who are fortunate
do. (Applause.)

I was reminded on my way over here of several of the
experiences that I have had in the last four years traveling on
behalf of our country. I was in Brazil, a maternal hospital--I
wrote about it in my book and I talked about it. It stays in my
mind because half the admissions were for the joy of giving
birth, and half the admissions were for complications resulting
from self-induced or back-alley abortions. And the Minister of
Health in a public meeting with me said, we want to give poor
women the same information and access to family planning that
well-to-do women have always had in our country. (Applause.)
That should be our goal not only here but also in our foreign
policy.

I also had th rather unique experience within a year
of traveling to China and speaking out against policies of forced
abortion and sterilization where the government made the choice
for women, and traveling to Romania that under the previous
communist regime had a policy of enforcing birth--five children
per woman. And I spoke with women who told me of every month
being taken as part of their work units to local hospitals where
they were forcefully examined to determine whether or not they
were pregnant so they could then be monitored by the secret
police to be sure they had the child.

Two extremes--government, on the one hand, saying
you cannot have children; government, on the other hand, saying
you must have children. What we have tried to do in promoting
choice is to say that this most difficult of all intimate choices
for women and men must be made by the individual in the privacy
of her consultation with her conscience, her God, her family, her
physician-- (applause.)

Thank you for continuing to try to get that message
across. Please join in helping us make these difficult decisions
rarer. Help us support women in all their needs. Help us
support families.

And I appreciate greatly the devotion and dedication
that so many of you have given to this over the years, and look
forward to working with you into the future. Thank you very
much. (Applause.)

THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Vice President
__________________________________________________________________
For immediate release January 22, 1997

Transcript of the Vice President's Remarks Before NARAL
January 21, 1997

Thank you. Thank you ladies and gentlemen. Tipper an I are
delighted to be here. She whispered to me just now to remind you
that the reason we were five minutes late for the Inaugural
ceremony is that we stayed longer than we were supposed to in
church that morning. (Laughter and applause). Thank you very
much.

It is great to be here. And Kate thank you as others have
thanked you for your extraordinary leadership and your untiring
advocacy of the rights of women. I also want to thank Nancy
Rubin, a longtime effective leader and advocate of the rights of
women and for her leadership in setting up this event. To
Barbara Silve (phonetic) and the other members of the NARAL
Board. And especially today to Robin Chandler Duke. Tipper
spoke today for me and for all of us with her words straight from
the heart about how strongly we feel about your lifetime
achievement Robin. Thank you for your personal friendship to
Tipper and me for so many years and may I add my words to those
that have already been well spoken here.

Let me also acknowledge, even though I understand that they
have been mentioned, I want to also acknowledge the members of
the House and Senate who are here because it takes great courage
in many cases for these individuals to take the stands that they
have taken. And I want to single out Senator Bob Kerrey, Senator
Chuck Robb, Senator Ron Wyden, Senator Barbara Boxer and other
Senators who are not here. And in the House of Representatives,
Rep. Ken Bentsen, Rep. Lloyd Doggett -- both from Texas, Rep. Bob
Filner, Rep. Elizabeth Furse, Rep. Jane Harmon, Rep Tom Lantos,
Rep. Nita Lowey, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Rep. Adam Smith and again
other members of the House who are not here.

And of course I want to acknowledge a great friend to Tipper
and me who was here earlier in your luncheon and acknowledge the
First Lady's leadership on this issue all around the world. I
think especially the way she represented the United States of
America and those who believe in the values for which our nation
stands when she traveled to Beijing and spoke truth to power in
that conference. I thought it was an extraordinary achievement,
one which she has replicated in many places around the world and
in this country.

She spoke about the events of earlier today. I will not
comment on them. I do not want to say that on Thursday we
witnessed the horror of two bombs being detonated at a family
planning clinic in Atlanta--the second bomb maliciously planted
for the specific purpose of harming the brave Americans who were
attending to the victims of the first explosion. Counter-
terrorists
experts point out that this is a pattern that first emerged in
some other places in the world known for endemic terror and
hatred.
It could not have been an accident in their view. On Sunday a
clinic in Tulsa, Oklahoma was struck by two bombs. The same
clinic had been firebombed not three weeks earlier.

To those who committed the horrible deeds of Tulsa and
Atlanta I say this on behalf of President Clinton and the
American people: The American people will not tolerate your
cowardly crusade. We Americans resolve our differences with
civilized discussion and spirited debate and elections and
constitutional processes not with pipe bombs, hand grenades and
instruments of hate. You will not prevail. (Applause)

These emotions we feel are fresh and strong in the immediate
aftermath of the majestic and peaceful transition from one four
year presidential term to the next. A peaceful transfer of power
that has taken place over and over again without violence ever
for more than 200 years.

The reason we are able to feel this way as Americans on
Inauguration Day--regardless of which party wins, regardless of
who we voted for, regardless of our feelings about the individual
who is up there taking the oath of office--the reason we feel an
enormous swell of pride is because we know that we have the
capacity of a free self-governing people to deal with differences
peacefully. By talking with one another, arguing with one
another, but arguing peacefully.

Let there be know doubt we will find the terrorists who
committed these horrible acts of the past week and we will punish
you to the full extent of the law. We will not let you terrorize
America's women or their doctors. (Applause) We will not let you
deface out constitution. (Applause) We will not let you destroy
the spirit of brotherhood and sisterhood that is America.
(Applause) We will find you. (Applause)

The anti-choice cause did not win in the nation's courts.
They did not win in the court of public opinion. They did not
win in the nation's elections. And its advocates will not
prevail by trampling our traditions or trafficking in terror.
These appalling attacks are assaults not merely against a single
building or a single gender but against America's deepest
principles.

In nation's with different traditions, they believe that
power comes out of the barrel of a gun. But in this nation we
know that true power comes out of disparate voices of a free
people.

I want to say one other word to those who have committed
these deeds. If you claim religious convictions compelled your
attempts to scare, your attempts to kill, you have committed an
appalling act of hypocrisy. No interpretation of God in any
religious tradition condones--let alone calls for--terror.
(Applause) Speaking from the perspective of my own religious
tradition, I say that the Bible offers no ballast. I quote from
1 John, Chapter two, verse 9: "Anyone who claims to be in the
light but hates his brother is still in the darkness."

We can disagree on some things, but women and men of
goodwill must agree that violence has no place in our dialogue of
democracy. Christian, Jew or Muslim or follower of some other
tradition, all Americans must work to ensure that light triumphs
over darkness. Billy Graham said it well earlier this week on
the steps of the U.S. Capitol when he asked God, and I quote,
"help us to learn our courtesy to our fellow countrymen, that
comes from the one who taught us that whatever you want me to do
to you, do also to them.'"

And Martin Luther King, Jr., whom we honored on the same day
as Inauguration Day, offered similar counsel. Listen to his
words: "Violence...is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the
opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to
annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it
thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and
makes brotherhood (and sisterhood) impossible."

The pro-choice movement, I'm proud to say, has never
resorted to violence. You have relied on reason. You have
worked within the system. And for that, I thank you and the
American people thank you. NARAL has built a tradition of
tolerance, and every one of you has made our country stronger. I
thank you for standing up for American's women and for their
right to choose.

Those who support women's rights and the right to choose
should also take care to avoid the language of violence. In
condemning those who have now resorted to violence on the other
side of this argument, let us acknowledge respectfully and
gratefully all of those who while disagreeing on this issue also
abhor the resort to violence. Yes, there are those who silently
welcome it though not participating in it themselves. But let us
not pretend that that is the majority. It is not. The majority
within this group that holds a minority opinion also deplore the
violence.

Coming out of the events of this week, I mentioned that
these emotions are fresh and strong because of what we have
experienced as a nation this week. And the desire for renewed
attempts to reach out for common ground is also strong and fresh.
Cardinal Bernardin was a leader among those who passionately
disagree on this issue but nevertheless attempted to construct a
dialogue aimed at mutual understanding.

I remember Cairo so well, primarily because it was an
occasion in which the entire world came together in search of
mutual understanding. I remember, I remember my case and the
crutches and going over there the week after my operation. Some
of you may recall it was my Achilles tendon and you probably
heard me explain that it was injured doing a helicopter dunk on
the basketball court. (Laughter) I caught my elbow on the rim
(laughter) coming down.

(Laughter) I still have to wear the full body case (laughter and
applause). But as I started to remember those meetings it all
came back to me. But I remember meeting with individuals of from
different religious traditions, from different political
cultures, from different ways of life, and talking in-depth about
what is involved for all of us as human beings as we confront
this issue.

For me the basic truth is this. When a woman faces a
situation that is so impossible complicated--for her, her family,
her relationship to God, her deepest beliefs, and feels that she
understands what's going on her life in a way that no one else
does--how can we as Americans, schooled in the deepest respect
for a proper relationship between the individual and the awesome
power of the state, how can we say that the government of the
United States of America with all of its power, with all of its
resources, with all of its distance and insensitivity to these
fragile and complex circumstances pressing in upon that
individual woman, how can we say that the government must come in
and order her to do what it has decided is the right thing and
hot her? It is wrong. It is wrong. (Applause)

I respect deeply those on the other side of this debate.
And the truth is, of course, that the vast majority who agree
with NARAL and the vast majority who agree with Cardinal
Bernardin and others who hold the opposite--who have held and
hold the opposite view--appreciates some, some aspects of each
others positions.

Four years ago, exactly four years ago, when these emotions
in the immediate aftermath of the Inauguration that I've referred
to twice were fresh then, I personally reached out to
individuals. I will not call their names because the
conversations were and shall remain private. But I reached out
to individuals who are leaders on the other side of this issue
and asked, is there a way to make common cause in the effort to
reduce the number of times women find themselves in a situation
where they go through this process of choosing?

The private response was, "you're right. There are a lot of
things we can do together." Upon reflection, the response some
weeks later was, "we just can't do it." Why?

Here's my interpretation. I know I'm on thin ice here.
There's no way to discuss these issues without venturing out on
this ice. The truth is that a minority within the minority also
believes that family planning, in the form of birth control and
even the giving of information about birth control, is morally
wrong. Of course I don't agree with that. I disagree strongly
as everyone here--I assume everyone here--does. But the way
coalitions are built and maintained is that sometimes deference
is inappropriately given to a mistaken view, clearly understood
as mistaken, for the purposes of cohesion. And so the vast
majority of those who are opposed to choice, and yet believe in
their hearts that of course giving birth control options is
sensible, refrain from ever saying that. And quietly support a
unified opposition to birth control as well.

If they were willing to abandon that aspect of their common
front then there would be much that we could all do together to
make abortions rare. We believe they should be safe, legal and
rare. Those who disagree on the first two believe that they
should be rare. There is a way, and we saw some of the outlines
in Cairo, to fashion such a common approach here in the United
States.

I would like to renew the comments I made privately almost
exactly four years ago to my friends who are in the opposite
camp. To in the spirit of Cardinal Bernardin, to reach out with
understanding as Americans, to heal our land, to say to all of
our people, in the aftermath of these bombings, regardless of our
views on the issue, we will not let this issue tear us apart as a
country. We must not. We will not.

In any event, we will not allow a women's right to choose to
be taken away. I say that firmly, plainly, so it is clearly
understood that it is not going to happen. But we do believe
that there is much we can do together.

In closing let me say, especially today, thank you, NARAL,
for pushing through the important legislation that must be a
bulwark against this violence--legislation like the Freedom of
Access to Clinic Entrances Act--and thank you for being such
staunch defenders of a women's right to choose, for standing so
tall even at a time when an anti-choice Congress has threatened
some important freedoms.

And on this anniversary of Rove v. Wade when some will try
and tug us backward to a time before that historic moment, we
must commit ourselves to moving forward beyond a debate about
just abortion. We are not and we never have been pro-abortion
obviously. We are pro-choice, pro-reproductive health, pro-
education,
pro-strong families, pro-women, pro-Constitutional
rights, pro the spirit of the United States of American which
will forever stand.

Thank you and may God bless you all.

The following was posted on a Marian News list, it is from the
Catholic News Service ...
------------------------------------------------
GORE LEADS POLITICAL ATTACK ON CATHOLICISM

Opinion/Analysis by Philip F. Lawler

Last Wednesday, in an address delivered to an abortion-rights
lobbying group on the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision,
Al Gore launched a political campaign against the Catholic
Church. It is difficult to say which is more chilling: the Vice
President's blatant attack on Catholicism, or the silence that
greeted it.

Evidently, the Vice President of the United States believes that
he can attack the Catholic faith with impunity, now that the
election is safely behind him. And just as evidently, the
nation's most prominent Catholic leaders are willing to accept
public insult rather than risk a public dispute. The weak
(indeed, nearly non-existent) public response to Gore's
anti-Catholic remarks virtually guarantees that the public
campaign against Catholicism will continue.

In his speech to the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights
Action League (NARAL), the Vice President did his best to portray
the pro-life stance as an "extreme" position, held by only a
minority of American citizens. That claim in itself is
dishonest, since the overwhelming majority of Americans, in poll
after poll, indicate their support for restrictions on-- if not
outright prohibition of-- abortion. But Gore did not stop there.

Instead, the Vice President went on to peddle the familiar
argument that the best way to reduce the number of abortions is
by promoting contraception. There is no evidence for that claim,
and indeed the original "sexologist," Dr. Kinsey, observed years
ago that contraception and abortion seem to flourish side by
side. But then, Gore was speaking to an audience of people who
make their money by performing abortions; was he really likely
to introduce any serious proposals that might cut down on their
business?

No, Gore's real goal in this speech was to disenfranchise the
pro-life movement-- or, to be more precise, the most dedicated
pro-life activists, who recognize that, as Pope John Paul II put
it, "abortion and contraception are fruits of the same tree."
Thus after scoffing at the pro-life "minority," the Vice
President continued: "The truth is that the minority within the
minority also believes that family planning, in the form of
birth control and even the giving of information about birth
control, is morally wrong."

Now of course it is true that Catholics are not the only
Americans who recognize the immorality of contraception.
Nevertheless, the Catholic Church is the only major institution
in our society which has steadfastly upheld the prohibition on
artificial birth control. So as a matter of political fact, when
Al Gore trained his sights on the opponents of contraception,
reasonable listeners could safely infer that he was planning an
attack on the Catholic Church.

Just moments later, that attack was underway. Scolding other pro-
lifers for keeping company with those who oppose contraception,
he said: "If they were willing to abandon that aspect of their
common font, there would be much that we could all do together
to make abortions rare." So here was the Vice President's
message to American pro-lifers: the Clinton Administration is
ready to strike a political deal with them-- if, and only if,
they stop associating with Catholics.

Under any ordinary circumstances, no rational politician would
dare to advance such a blatant insult (let alone such an
implicit political threat) against the nation's largest single
religious body. But these are not ordinary times, and Gore has
calculated his advantage carefully. After years of observing the
decay within the Church in America, he knows that most Catholics
are too timid to defend the Catholic teaching that contraception
is immoral. More damaging still, he knows that if he is accused
of harboring an anti-Catolic bias, scores of prominent Americans
who call themselves Catholic will rally to his defense.

In fact, the Vice President showed a keen understanding of the
tensions among Catholic Americans. Three times in the course of
his speech to NARAL, Gore invoked the memory of the late
Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, whom he praised for his effort to
"construct a dialogue aimed at mutual understanding." No other
individual-- not even President Clinton-- was named more than
once in his speech. Clearly Gore reasoned that by invoking the
authority of the deceased Chicago prelate, he could ward off
criticism from other Catholic leaders. On the same day, both
Bill and Hillary Clinton also paid homage to Bernardin in their
respective addresses to pro-abortion groups. The late cardinal
has become the Catholic leader most favorably regarded by the
abortion lobby.

In 1983 Al Gore, then a young Congressman from Tennessee, wrote
to a pro-life constituent: "Let me assure you that I share your
belief that innocent human life must be protected." Now the same
Al Gore seeks not only to eliminate all protection for unborn
human life, but also to disenfranchise those who still hold the
position which he has now, conveniently, abandoned.

Dr. Bernard Nathanson--once a leading abortionist, now a
dedicated pro-lifer and recent convert to Catholicism--has
revealed that in its early years, NARAL concocted a deliberate
public strategy based on anti-Catholicism, hoping to make it
difficult for Catholics to engage in the public debate on
abortion. At the time NARAL was a small, radical organization,
routinely engaged in efforts to subvert and violate the law. Now
NARAL is a large national lobby, and the Vice President of the
United States has adopted the same tactics.

Is the victory of the abortion culture in America so complete
that a politician who once acknowledged the horror of abortion
can now shamelessly promote the practice, without being chastised
for his hypocrisy? Is the decline of public Catholicism so
advanced that the nation's second most powerful official can
adopt the strategy of anti-Catholic extremists? In the wake of
Gore's contemptible speech to NARAL, the public silence is
speaking volumes.

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