WASHINGTON — In the House of Representatives on May 7, lawmakers passed an amendment that would eliminate the Mexico City policy that for 17 years has ensured U.S. funds do not support U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) projects that violate human rights.

A March 31 State Department report said forced abortion and sterilization policies exist in the 32 counties where the U.N. Population Fund has operations.

The prohibitions have been included in every overseas funding bill since 1985. They have been renewed by presidents Ronald Reagan, the first George Bush and George W. Bush.

It is known as the Mexico City Policy because it was at a population conference in Mexico City in 1984 that the Reagan administration first introduced the requirement that the U.N. Population Fund provide “concrete assurances that [it] is not engaged in, or does not provide funding for, abortion or coercive family-planning programs.”

The new move against the policy came in the House International Relations Committee in May. Austin Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (and a Register columnist — see Page 8) said lawmakers “gutted an old U.S. human-rights law in order to fund a coercive U.N. agency, UNFPA.”

The Mexico City policy has prohibited federal funds from going to any “organization or program that supports or participates in the management of a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.”

The new Crowley amendment, sponsored by U.S. Rep. Joseph Crowley of New York, only disallows UNFPA from “directly" coerced women. Indirect support of China's forced sterilization, therefore, would still be a legitimate use of U.S. funds, according to the new language.

Twenty-two Democrats and one Republican on the International Relations Committee voted on May 7 in favor of the Crowley amendment.

In a press release, Crowley called the Mexico City policy “a disgrace.”

“Restoring U.S. funding for UNFPA programs is crucial to improving the health of women and their families and to addressing rapid population growth,” he said.

“UNPFA provides international leadership on population issues and is a key source of financial assistance for family-planning programs in developing countries. It is a disgrace that the Bush administration has held UNPFA funding back.”

U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, R.-N.J., wants to save the Mexico City policy. “The amendment is wrong,” he said.

“Human rights are worth fighting for. In the words of Dongfan Ma, who was forced to have an abortion in China and now lives in the United States in freedom because of human-rights laws we fought for in the past: ‘Through this denial of UNPFA funds by President Bush and supported by a bipartisan group of U.S. congressional representatives, conscience and human nature will triumph over barbaric policies imposed on families in China.’"

Scott Weinberg of the Population Research Institute said efforts to end the Mexico City policy come at an interesting time. “Pro-abortion Democrats would rather fund a group that supports coercive abortion in China than send life-saving aid to women in Afghanistan,” he said. “They know UNPFA supports coercive abortion, so they want to gut U.S. federal law to fund this renegade organization. Thank God we have a president who will support, defend and preserve" the Mexico City policy.

“It is despicable to me that proponents of this amendment are so extreme in their support for U.N. Population Fund that they are trying to weaken 17-year-old human rights law,” Smith said. “Instead of seeking to weaken the law, they should help women who have been victimized and pressure the U.N. Population Fund to divest itself of programs that rely on coercion. Instead of lowering the bar on human rights they should be trying to get UNPFA to increase their efforts to meet fundamental human-rights standards.”

Hill insiders believe the Mexico City policy will be restored before the bill becomes law. The change “was approved by a one-vote margin in the House committee because some good people were absent,” said Richard Doerflinger of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. “The policy should be restored by the full House, and I expect it will be.”

Wendy Wright of Concerned Women for America said pro-life groups will make sure of that. They will be recommending voters contact lawmakers who oppose the Mexico City policy in the coming weeks.

The policy “is very important — not just as a statement that the United States will not support coerced abortion or sterilization,” she said, “but because, as it's become too clear, there are elected and government officials in the United State who have to be legally restrained from funding programs that are coercive.”

The earliest a vote is expected in the full House is in late June.

Kathryn Jean Lopez is the editor of National Review Online.