For all the attention paid to Prop 8, less attention was paid to South Dakota Initiative Two, which would have banned all abortion except in the cases of rape, incest, or the mother's health. It went down, 55%-45%. And the "personhood" amendment did even worse in Colorado. This is something to keep in mind as the GOP contemplates moving even more aggressively to emphasize contrasts on abortion and gay marriage: while a whole lot of people consider themselves pro-life, many of those people don't really want to make abortion illegal or overturn Roe. Indeed, while the pro-choice/pro-life split is about even in most polls, polls also show 2:1 support for retaining Roe (albeit with some restrictions, like parental notification).
Now, Americans don't vote solely on abortion. Not by any means. So moving aggressively to the right on abortion (for example, championing a "life amendment") probably wouldn't sink the GOP any lower than they already are. This is sad but true. However, it is unlikely that such policies would add voters to the GOP column, and ceding the center ground on the abortion position to the Democrats would be fatal to the pro-life movement, especially since Barack Obama and the Democrats have developed compelling new rhetoric that doesn't really sound much like the "if it feels good, do it" caricature that wingnuts have been distributing for years. That was very effective, and it probably helped grow the pro-life movement immensely. But the pro-life movement is in real danger if it definse pro-lifeism as "banning all abortion" because, as you see, even in one of the most pro-life states in the Union such measures are defeated handily. In the end, I believe that savvy pro-lifers will embrace the same "abortion reduction" argument as pro-choicers seemingly have. So much the better.
