Health-care debate puts some female GOP lawmakers in a tough position

After Gov. Christie rejected a $7.5 million allocation for women's health care in the Democrats' proposed budget, legislators convened in July to consider overriding his veto.

Democrats, who lack a veto-proof majority, voted to reinstate the line item. All but one Republican who voted sided with the governor.

And then there was Sen. Diane Allen (R., Burlington), who abstained.

"I thought it was wrong, the whole playing of politics," Allen recalled recently in her Burlington City office.

The Democrats knew Christie would reject their unbalanced spending plan, and for political gain they put Republicans in the untenable position of having to cancel programs, she said.

Her abstention "was my tiny mini-protest," Allen explained.

The override motion died, but the women's health-care issue has not.

Allen introduced a bill Sept. 26 that would provide $6.3 million in grants for women's health services at county health departments. Also a sponsor was Sen. Jennifer Beck (Monmouth), the lone GOP legislator to vote for the override.

The measure is the latest turn in the long dispute about how New Jersey should provide public money for contraceptives, prenatal care, Pap smears, and other cancer screenings for poor women.

The debate has put some Republican female lawmakers, such as Allen, in the uncomfortable position of having to decide whether to break with their party or appear to be unsympathetic to women's needs.

For decades, little attention was paid to the state's $7.5 million allocation to public and private providers of family-planning services, which tend to a variety of women's health concerns.

Then came the budget crunch of 2010. To close a deficit, Christie eliminated the item along with billions of dollars in other spending.

He and legislative Republicans framed the cut in fiscal terms, but Democrats accused the Republican governor of trying to burnish his national conservative credentials by denying money to Planned Parenthood.

In June 2010, days before the deadline to pass the fiscal 2011 budget, Allen and Beck broke with GOP ranks and voted for a supplemental women's health appropriation of $7.5 million.

But they appeared to reverse course soon after by refusing to join the Democrats' attempted override to Christie's veto.

Allen said that her action was based on new fiscal information from the administration and that she had not been pressured by Christie, as some Democrats contended.