On abortion, Romney's "moratorium" on changes in the law gets lower marks, since it prevents any movement in a pro-life direction. Even so, Kristian Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute, recognizes that Romney's position on abortion is "more conservative than some of the alternatives in our state." Romney knows that a moratorium wouldn't be viable at the federal level, where abortion policy has multiple opportunities to move this way or that, through new legislation, new regulations and new litigation.

"It would be very different for anyone that is considering a federal office — they have a very different series of considerations they have to look at," he says. "But given the fact that I am not running for federal office at this point in my life, I am not going to get into exactly how I would solve that." Perhaps later.

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Romney knows firsthand how his religion can be exploited in negative campaigning. When he ran against Ted Kennedy in 1994, then-congressman Joe Kennedy, the senator's nephew, said Romney was "a member of the white boys' club," a not-so-veiled reference to the Mormon priesthood, closed to blacks until 1978, when then-church President Spencer Kimball, having received the necessary revelation, announced that the priesthood was open to males without regard to race or ethnicity. The Kennedy campaign also said that Romney's church treated not just black people but also women (because they are barred from the priesthood) as "second-class citizens."

Romney responded: "I am sad to see Ted Kennedy taking away his brother's victory," saying he opposed discrimination in any form but would not "publicly criticize" his church. Ted Kennedy's brother John faced and overcame anti-Catholic sentiment in 1960, when he became the first (and so far only) Catholic to be elected president. Ted Kennedy backed away from his campaign's use of Mormonism, saying, "I believe that religion should not be an issue." For his part, Joe Kennedy said he didn't know that the priesthood had been opened to blacks, and he apologized.

But the attack may have had the desired effect. Ted Kennedy's poll numbers went up and stayed up. For Romney personally, the episode was especially ugly, since his father was an early, strong advocate of the 1960s civil rights laws. Romney told me that "the happiest day" in his life from a religious standpoint occurred when Kimball said blacks could now enter the priesthood. "I was driving when it came on the radio, on Fresh Pond Parkway. I pulled over and went into a parking lot. I was overjoyed."