Editorial

By now, we've probably heard most every potential spin on Tuesday's election results. How they figure into the gubernatorial election. What they mean for the budget. And whether they strengthen the unions, or the Democrats, or the notion of bipartisan cooperation. You name it.

Pushing all that aside, there's a good case to be made that the election results may have a very positive influence on the fate of AB651, one of the year's most talked-about bills. Talked about, especially, by me: I work for one of the bill's authors.

The bill is AB 651, by Assemblywoman Patty Berg, D-Eureka, and Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, D-Van Nuys. It would give terminally ill Californians the same rights afforded Oregonians under that state's landmark Death With Dignity Act.

Social and religious conservatives don't like AB 651, to put it mildly. They hate it, and have rallied parishioners against it with a fervor rare even in the hyperbole-prone world of legislative advocacy. In meeting after meeting with lawmakers and staff, they have pushed the notion that voting in favor of AB 651 is politically risky.

They warn of wasted political capital. They warn of a backlash from voters.

They don't just ignore nonpartisan polls that show nearly three out of four Californians support the idea, they dispute the claims. They dispute the Field Poll. They dispute the PPIC. It's the same tactic used, interestingly enough, by supporters of the governor's ill-fated slate of ballot measures.

Supporters of the bill continue to say that it is, in fact, a perfectly safe vote. In addition to the large public polls, which show consistent support, they've conducted their own opinion surveys and found that voters won't be moved at all by a vote for AB 651.

And that's where Proposition 73 comes in.

Proposition 73, the parental notification initiative, sought to tap into the very same vein of social conservatism that opponents of AB 651 have been touting. But guess what? It didn't work. California is, as it has been, a socially progressive state.

Conservative religious leaders took to the pulpits and urged support for Proposition 73. They rallied the faithful. This, after all, was their signature issue: abortion. It was on the ballot, they could not only have restricted access to the procedure, they could have enshrined in the state constitution that abortion was, basically, murder. California's own constitution would have included a right-wing bumper sticker. But this was not to be.

In a bit of good news for the Berg-Levine team, it was many of the same churches who flooded Capitol offices with little postcards against AB 651, who tried to pass Proposition 73.

And now the failure of Proposition 73 undercuts their ability to give lawmakers the jitters on Death with Dignity. Because, seriously, if conservatives can't pass a ballot measure on their most bedrock issue, why should we think they drum up support to punish a lawmaker who votes for AB 651.

Sure, the bill's opponents will say that their opposition is broader than just religious conservatives. Maybe so, but not very much broader. The real support, the money for a campaign strategist and a professional spokesman does indeed come from the same source as the opposition to 73.

Bottom line, the failure of the right to curtail reproductive freedom speaks volumes about their ability to make a difference at the polls. And that in turn speaks volumes about the credibility of their argument that supporting the rights of the terminally ill is a risky business.

Will Shuck, a former daily newspaper reporter, is press secretary to Assemblywoman Patty Berg, D-Eureka.

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