Archbishop's web site Denver Catholic Register Parishes Catholic Pastoral Center
August 16, 2000
Lieberman seen as a good pick for Gore
By Jerry Filteau
WASHINGTON (CNS) - Political pundits quickly declared that Vice President Al Gore made an astute choice Aug. 7 in asking Connecticut Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman to fill out the Democratic ticket for this fall's presidential election.
Catholic officials took a mixed view, noting that Lieberman consistently opposes any legislation to restrict abortion, but on the other hand is a co-sponsor of a Catholic-backed bill to improve end-of-life medical care and ban assisted suicide.
He is also a longtime backer of voucher or tax credit legislation to promote private school choice. In 1995, delivering the 13th annual Seton-Neumann lecture to a gathering of the nation's Catholic bishops, he urged them to lobby Congress personally for funding for school choice.
A longtime critic of sex and violence in the media, he led the fight to mandate V-chips, parental screening devices, in all new televisions. He used the threat of federal regulation to force the TV and video game industries to adopt self-rating systems.
Auxiliary Bishop Peter A. Rosazza of Hartford — who lives in New Haven, Lieberman's home town, and has known the senator for years — told Catholic News Service, "I have the greatest regard for him as a person. He's a man of principle and a warm, good, good human being."
He added that Lieberman's Seton-Neumann lecture "was the best talk I've heard in that series."
Bishop Rosazza declined, however, to comment on the senator's political positions or his candidacy for vice president.
Marie T. Hilliard, Connecticut Catholic Conference executive director, took the same position, saying the conference never comments on candidates, only on issues.
Lieberman, an Orthodox Jew who has missed his own state's nominating convention because it was on the Sabbath, is the first Jew in U.S. history to be selected as a major-party nominee for president or vice president.
Born in Stamford, Conn., Feb. 24, 1942, he graduated from Yale University in 1964 and earned his law degree there in 1967.
He was a member of the Connecticut Senate, 1971-81, and was majority leader, 1975-81. He was state attorney general, 1983-89, and entered the U.S. Senate in 1989.
He received wide national attention in September 1998, after President Clinton acknowledged his affair with Monica Lewinsky, when he was the first Democrat to take the Senate floor and criticize Clinton.
"Such behavior is not just inappropriate. It is immoral," he said. He added that the affair's "harmful" message to American children "is as influential as the negative message that is communicated by the entertainment culture."
Word of Gore's choice of Lieberman immediately drew strong protests from right-to-life groups.
"In 71 pro-life votes during his tenure in the U.S. Senate, Lieberman supported the pro-life position only twice," said the Pro-Life Infonet, an online news and information service on life issues sponsored by Women and Children First. "From 1990-99 Lieberman compiled a 97 percent pro-abortion voting record."
The National Right to Life Committee said that Lieberman opposed the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, sponsored a Freedom of Choice Act to limit the ability of states to regulate abortions, and "has consistently voted to authorize funding of unlimited abortion under Medicaid and other federal health programs."
Matthew Boyle of Bridgeport, Conn., executive director of the Connecticut Federation of Catholic School Parents, said Lieberman "is definitely in favor of school vouchers" as a means of "empowering parents to exercise their choice of schools."
He added, however, that "this year, when we were pushing for a (state) tax credit, we wrote and asked his support, and his support was not there."
Boyle attributed that to Lieberman being under consideration for the Gore ticket and therefore under new constraints not to break with the national party's official position against voucher or tax credit programs.
While Lieberman is a friend of private education, Boyle said, "as a Catholic, I would say the most important issue is the pro-life issue." He stressed that in that comment he was expressing "my own personal opinion as a Catholic," not speaking as an official of the parents' federation.
The fact that Lieberman is the first Jew to be selected for a top spot on a major-party ticket provoked wide media discussion of whether his religion would be a factor in the election. Most commentators said it probably would not hurt and might help.
The Gallup Poll said its own recent polling "suggests that Lieberman's faith should not represent a liability for the ticket."
In a February poll, it said, "only 6 percent (of Americans) say they would not be willing to support a Jewish candidate" on a presidential ticket.
In that poll, when people were asked what difference religious affiliation would make in supporting a "generally well qualified person for president" 94 percent said they would be willing to vote for such a person of the Catholic or Baptist faith, and 92 percent said they would be willing to vote for such a person of the Jewish faith.
The Gallup report added, "More damaging than any particular religious preference tested is no preference at all. The survey finds close to half of Americans, 48 percent, unwilling to support an atheist for president."
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