Sen. Brownback Still Undecided on Harriet Miers Over Abortion 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
October 7, 2005
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — Leading pro-life Sen. Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican, says he’s still undecided on whether he will support Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers. Earlier in the week, Brownback said he would be unable to vote for Miers’ confirmation if she said she believed Roe v. Wade was "settled law."
After meeting with Miers for an hour, Brownback said he still needs more information about her views on abortion before he can make up his mind.
"The portrait is just now taking shape and I’m not ready to make a call until that portrait is done," Brownback said at a press conference. "I have not determined … at this point, how I would vote."
Brownback is one of many pro-life skeptics on Miers despite new information coming to light of her pro-life background.
As the head of the Texas Bar Association in the early 1990s, Miers led an effort to change the ABA’s position on abortion from pro-abortion to neutral. She’s described as pro-life by her long-time companion, pro-life Texas Supreme Court Justice Nathan Hecht and by her former city council campaign manager.
Miers donated $150 in 1989 to a Texas pro-life group and attended at least two pro-life banquets. She also attends a strongly pro-life evangelical Christian church and she is described as being very involved in it.
Brownback would still like more information about whether Miers supports or wants to reverse the Roe decision that ushered in an era of 44 million abortions. Despite not knowing that, he said he is reassured somewhat by President Bush’s strong faith in her views to strictly uphold the Constitution.
"She did not take a position on it, nor did she say she would take a position on it, nor did she think it appropriate to have a position on it," Brownback said of his discussion with her about the landmark ruling. "No promises were made either way."
However, Brownback did tell the press conference Miers indicated she supported the notion of judicial restraint — not creating fictitious rights not found in the Constitution, as the justices did with abortion in 1973.
