Robert Casey Quotes
I am fairly certain that my abortion position hurt me, because in a Democratic primary, where turnout is relatively low, liberal voters turn out in disproportionately large numbers and thus exercise a disproportionate influence on the outcome.
Casey, Robert P. Fighting for Life: The Story of a Courageous Pro-Life Democrat. Word Publishing, 1996.
This quotation is very surprising to most people who are not familiar with the history of the struggle regarding abortion in America. In the early days of the family planning movement and when abortion rights were first advocated in America, the proponents were almost all Republicans. At the time, the Republican Party consisted of economic conservatives and social liberals—“Rockefeller Republicans they would later be called. At the same time the Democratic Party was aligned very differently. The Southern Conservatives and fundamentalist Protestants of the Bible Belt were all Democrats. Most Roman Catholics were Democrats. Intellectuals at the time tended to side with the Democrats on economic issues and with the Republicans on social issues. In the 1960s the Republicans went after the racist resentment in the South over the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Southern Democrats of the Solid South switched to the Republican Party, and many liberal republicans, reacting to their party now being the party of the the anti equality racists, became Republicans. The Southern Democrats then pushed out the moderate Republicans who were the social liberals.
Robert Patrick Casey Sr. was an American lawyer and politician from Pennsylvania who served as the Democratic 42nd Governor of Pennsylvania from 1987 to 1995. He served as a member of the Pennsylvania Senate for the 22nd district from 1963 to 1968 and as Auditor General of Pennsylvania from 1969 to 1977.
