Fred Thompson Defends Overturning Abortion Case, Calls It Pro-Life Victory 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
November 26, 2007
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — In what has become a weekly ritual, Fred Thompson appeared on a Sunday political talk show and asked again to discuss his position on abortion. Thompson said he takes a pro-life position and favors overturning Roe v. Wade and allowing states the opportunity to ban abortions as they did before the 1973 case.
The former Tennessee senator appeared on the Fox News Sunday program and Chris Wallace asked him if he believed that "life begins at conception" and that "abortion is the taking of life."
Thompson answered yes to both questions.
Wallace showed Thompson a video of pro-life Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee criticizing Thompson for supporting the reversal of Roe but not backing a human life amendment.
Thompson said Huckabee had the same position until recently and then went on to define his position.
"Because of Roe vs. Wade, all states are restricted from passing rules that they otherwise would maybe like to pass with regard to this area. If you abolish Roe vs. Wade, you’re going to allow every state to pass reasonable rules that they might see fit to pass," Thompson said.
He indicated that, during his tenure in the Senate, Congress never came close to having enough votes for a human life amendment.
"When we had control of the House, had control of the Senate, had control of the presidency, there wasn’t a serious effort to put forth a constitutional amendment because people knew that it couldn’t pass — couldn’t pass, wouldn’t pass," Thompson said.
As a result, Thompson said he favors doing something that can be accomplished and will save countless lives of unborn children.
"What I’ve been talking about is directing our energy toward something that was halfway practical, something that might could get done. That has to do with federal judges. It has to do with the Supreme Court. It has to do with Roe vs. Wade," he told Wallace.
"So now where we have no states with the option of doing anything about it, then we would have however many states wanted to. You could move from zero yard line, you know, to the 60- or 70-yard line instead of standing pat, which is what we’re doing how, which is where we will remain if we don’t abolish Roe vs. Wade," Thompson explained.
Wallace played another video of Thompson saying he supported allowing states to decide if they want to ban abortions or not. Wallace tried to get the GOP candidate to say that’s a "pro-choice" position.
"No, not really. I mean, how many pro-choice people say that they want to see the abolition of Roe vs. Wade? I don’t know any," Thompson replied. "What I’m talking about is abolishing Roe vs. Wade."
Ultimately, Thompson said the pro-life movement would win if Roe is reversed.
"I mean, the gain would be on the pro-life side. I mean, they have Roe vs. Wade and all of the progeny from that already," he said. "They could place restrictions on abortion that they can’t do now."
Thompson said that if the pro-life movement can’t get to the day when Roe is overturned, it will never get to the day when a human life amendment is approved.
"But if we can’t carry the argument, if we can’t win the argument, which I think that we are winning nationwide now, we can never pass a constitutional amendment anyway," Thompson said.
"We sit here and talk about the ideal which would be a constitutional amendment, two-thirds of the Congress, three-fourths of the states, and are basically saying that we could get that done, but we can’t go state by state and win this argument?" Thompson added.
"I believe that’s wrong. I think we could make substantial progress," he concluded.
