Reply #12: One of the first times, if I recall correctly, where the abortion

[salin]

issue was used - graphically - in an election. I believe that part of the very ugly campaign against Bayh was imagery purported to be of an aborted fetus. A very scary harbinger of things to come.

No, he was not seen to have grown "more liberal" or "too liberal" for Indiana - indeed his son was elected a few years later to a state wide election (either attorney general or secretary of state) based almost primarily on his father's name. He parlayed that statewide name recognition to run for Governor in 1988. (Birch was defeated in 1982). Not sure how Evan ran in his first statewide race, but he ran as a fiscal centrist - but stalwart of unions and other democratic standards in his first race for governor. Note that during the early eighties the state tried to bust all the unions. Evan's ascension to governor helped stem that tide/trend - and won him a lot of loyalty among many socially conservative (former repub voting) union members in the state.

oops on edit - it appears my memory is incorrect and that B. Bayh was defeated in 1980, not 1982.