The canceled pro-lifer

In February, members of the DuPage County board in Illinois voted to remove longtime Congressman Henry Hyde’s name from the county courthouse. To my knowledge, this is the first time a name has been removed from a government building for a person whose primary achievement was pro-life legislation.

Who was Henry Hyde? He was a member of Congress representing a suburban district in Chicago from 1975-2007. Although he never ascended to a greater office, Henry Hyde’s name was attached to some of the most important legislation of the last 50 years. His Hyde amendment, passed in 1976, prohibited the use of federal funds to pay for abortions except in certain circumstances such as protecting the life of the mother. The legislation was historic in its impact because it represented the first reversal for pro-abortion policy after the sweeping decision of the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade. Through Congress, Americans were able to draw a line so as to limit the federal government’s support of abortion. It was important to do so because abortions soared despite the belief of some abortion advocates that the procedure would be little-used given the availability of the birth control pill.

While it was Ronald Reagan who emphatically made the Republican party a pro-life party after President Ford’s wife Betty had publicly offered her support for abortion, it was Hyde who made the first big move. One indicator of the popularity of Hyde’s measure was that then-Sen. Joe Biden supported it. That was a position Biden would later recant as the hold of pro-abortion advocacy on the Democrat party strengthened. Until the Court overruled Roe with its Dobbs decision, the Hyde amendment was a staple of the national debates over abortion and stood as a kind of marker indicating that while abortion was permitted as a constitutional right, it was more tolerated by the nation than enthusiastically endorsed. Hyde’s amendment was both morally right and politically brilliant. It captured a majority position in a country torn by the sudden revolution wrought by Roe.

Now, Hyde’s name comes off of a county courthouse. As the Wall Street Journal pointed out, this is no removal of a former Confederate or proponent of southern segregation. Henry Hyde’s signature contribution to American public affairs was preventing federal money from being used to fund abortions. Biden supported the Hyde amendment for nearly four decades. Hillary Clinton’s running mate Tim Kaine, U.S. senator from Virginia, had also been a supporter of the amendment. It looks as though a blue-leaning county now finds it acceptable to remove the name of a man who successfully authored an abortion limitation once supported by some of the biggest names in American politics, left and right. Given that the removal of a name conveys a sense of real dishonor, this is a moment that should not pass lightly.

There are some important responses to the removal of Hyde’s name. First, there is nothing dishonorable about Henry Hyde’s career as a pro-life stalwart. On the contrary, the measure he authored gained the support of many major American politicians (including pro-abortion rights politicians) and gave pro-lifers the ability to be less morally implicated in the practice of the procedure by reducing their financial support of it. Second, there is something painfully partisan about going around to various edifices and wiping out names of people who no longer fit the electoral profile of the area.

I queried Google’s Gemini on this specific question of removing Hyde’s name from the courthouse because I wanted to know what kind of verdict it would render. Gemini was clear in its summary that the action was fitting according to evolving sensibilities. The assumption would seem to be that ardent pro-life leadership of the type Hyde embodied somehow doesn’t accord with that Obama-esque arc of history that bends toward justice.

But I think the board members of DuPage County are the ones who have failed to see far enough to discern the arc of just sentiments and action. Abortion no longer has the prestige of the Supreme Court behind it, and that’s important.

And no matter how many short-term victories contribute to the seeming triumph of abortion rights advocates, I believe the longer the issue stands before us the more likely it is that we will confront the reality. We cannot continue to sustain the illusion that one child has rights and the other does not merely because he or she is wanted by his or her parents. Henry Hyde is likely to see his pro-life reputation grow as we stride into the future.