WASHINGTON — Even as President Obama flies to the University of Notre Dame this weekend to give a commencement speech that promises to be marked by bitter abortion protests, he will be grappling with one of the most critical decisions of his presidency.
With a new poll out Friday showing that for the first time a majority of Americans call themselves "pro-life," the decision of whom to nominate to the U.S. Supreme Court has grown even more complex.
Obama is determined to avoid a "culture war" over the choice, White House aides and Democratic lawyers say, and he hopes to select a candidate who will not galvanize conservative activists over wedge issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage.
With that in mind, the White House is poring over the records of leading candidates for the high court, looking for potential flash points. That could lead to problems for some who are thought to be on Obama's short list.
For example, Judge Diane P. Wood, a veteran of the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, has a strong record in support of abortion rights. She was a law clerk to Justice Harry Blackmun, the author of the Roe vs. Wade opinion, and she dissented when the appeals court upheld Wisconsin and Illinois bans on a late-term abortion procedure called dilation and extraction, which opponents call "partial birth" abortion. She also wrote an opinion reviving a lawsuit against the leaders of the antiabortion group Operation Rescue for using violence and "human blockades" to shut down abortion clinics. But the Supreme Court unanimously reversed her opinion in 2006.
As the Democratic governors of Michigan and Arizona, respectively, Jennifer M. Granholm and Janet Napolitano -- two other potential court candidates -- vetoed state bans on dilation and extraction. (Napolitano is now secretary of Homeland Security.)
Americans United for Life, an antiabortion group, issued its evaluation of the abortion records of nine potential nominees to the high court. Charmaine Yoest, the group's president, called them "radically pro-abortion."
Obama has been a steady defender of the Roe decision and the right to abortion generally. But he has long sought to defuse tension over the issue.
Abortion-rights rhetoric was largely absent from his presidential campaign, and he has been seeking some middle ground.
The White House launched an effort last month to bring abortion-rights opponents and supporters together to craft policies on reducing unwanted pregnancies and limiting demand for abortions.
