As far as the anti-abortion vote in Kansas tonight, this shows what happened after abortion was divorced as the stalking horse for segregated schools. Ralph Reed roped Jerry Falwell in, because Falwell was concerned about the tax-exempt status of his segregation academy in Lynchburg, Va.

As long as “pro-life” was the public face of private “segregation now” which propelled Ronald Reagan into office, Evangelicals (who were mostly non-voters prior to the election of Jimmy Carter) were mostly non-voters. Aside from Catholics, no one really wanted the government interfering in people’s private medical decisions.

When the forced-birth movement became a life of its own, the segregationists no longer had a reason to support it. They are reverting to the original Evangelical position of the government should stay out of medical decisions of individuals. The original position of Evangelicals was that a foetus did not count as a life until it was born (using the Bible as the justification for that position).