The Choice That Pro-Choicers Aren’t Pro

IN EARLY 1992, cable-television watchers across America were surprised to see a commercial that was patently pro-life. It was an attractive, professionally done commercial, the kind that might promote Chase Manhattan Bank or U.S. Healthcare, with artfully shot photos of kids, lots of beautiful kids. A school door opens and children in parochial-school uniforms pour out laughing; impish toddlers grin out at us from Halloween costumes. Meanwhile a warm-sounding voice says: “All these children have one thing in common. All of them were unplanned pregnancies . . . that could have ended in abortion. But their parents toughed it out, listened to their hearts and discovered . . . that sometimes the best things in life aren’t planned. Life. What a beautiful choice.”

This is one of a series of pro-life ads still being run by the Arthur S. DeMoss Foundation, a Christian evangelical group based in St. Davids, Pennsylvania. As Newsweek reports, the late Arthur DeMoss was a born-again Christian who made a fortune in the insurance business. His widow, Nancy, now heads the foundation, which contributes to such groups as Campus Crusade for Christ, the Pat Boone Foundation, and the conservative Free Congress Foundation.

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Maria McFadden

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IN EARLY 1992, cable-television watchers across America were surprised to see a commercial that was patently pro-life. It was an attractive, professionally done commercial, the kind that might promote Chase Manhattan Bank or U.S. Healthcare, with artfully shot photos of kids, lots of beautiful kids. A school door opens and children in parochial-school uniforms pour out laughing; impish toddlers grin out at us from Halloween costumes. Meanwhile a warm-sounding voice says: “All these children have one thing in common. All of them were unplanned pregnancies . . . that could have ended in abortion. But their parents toughed it out, listened to their hearts and discovered . . . that sometimes the best things in life aren’t planned. Life. What a beautiful choice.”

This is one of a series of pro-life ads still being run by the Arthur S. DeMoss Foundation, a Christian evangelical group based in St. Davids, Pennsylvania. As Newsweek reports, the late Arthur DeMoss was a born-again Christian who made a fortune in the insurance business. His widow, Nancy, now heads the foundation, which contributes to such groups as Campus Crusade for Christ, the Pat Boone Foundation, and the conservative Free Congress Foundation.