Missouri abortion rights measure is invalid, judge says days before deadline
The judge said he wouldn’t order the measure removed from the ballot until Tuesday, the deadline for printing the ballots, to allow abortion rights groups to appeal.
A Missouri judge ruled that an abortion ballot measure is invalid because it did not properly note which laws it would repeal, potentially restricting it from reaching a November vote.
Cole County Circuit Judge Christopher Limbaugh said the measure’s proponents did not sufficiently inform voters who signed petitions for the proposed amendment of its ramifications, echoing arguments made in a legal challenge by antiabortion advocates.
Limbaugh, appointed by Gov. Mike Parson (R) after serving as his general counsel, wrote in the Friday ruling that he would not issue an injunction ordering Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft (R) to remove the measure until Tuesday, when the ballots are scheduled to be printed, allowing proponents of the measure known as Amendment 3 to file an appeal.
Missourians for Constitutional Freedom vowed to do just that.
“The court’s decision to block Amendment 3 from appearing on the ballot is a profound injustice to the initiative petition process and undermines the rights of the nearly 380,000+ Missourians who signed our petition demanding a voice on this critical issue,” Rachel Sweet, the group’s campaign manager, said in a statement.
If passed, Amendment 3 would permit the procedure until fetal viability, or about 24 weeks, the point in a pregnancy when a fetus can survive outside the womb.
Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, an abortion rights group, is seeking to enshrine in the state constitution “the right to make and carry out decisions about all matters relating to reproductive health care,” including abortion care. Missouri has a near-total ban on abortion.
Depending on how a higher court rules, Missouri voters could join those in at least nine other states in deciding the fate of abortion rights in November with constitutional amendments on the ballot in a pivotal election year. That includes several measures in battleground states that will be key to deciding control of the White House and Congress.
Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, every ballot measure that has sought to preserve or expand abortion access has passed, even in more conservative states. Measures that have sought to restrict abortion access, meanwhile, have failed.
Because Amendment 3 did not address the full scope of which state laws would be affected, Limbaugh said the measure was “insufficient” and a “blatant violation” of the requirements.
Mary Catherine Martin, an attorney for the antiabortion legal group the Thomas More Society, praised the judge’s ruling.
She also argued that the scope of the amendment was too wide and that Missouri ballot measures must focus narrowly on one issue. Missouri has what’s known as a “single-subject rule,” which requires constitutional ballot initiatives to address only one issue.
“This goes far beyond abortion,” said Martin, who helped file the legal challenge. “It’s not just an abortion amendment.”
She argued that the measure’s inclusion of the phrase “all matters of reproductive health care” means it covers more than just abortion access. Arguments could be made in front of an appeals court or the state Supreme Court as late as Tuesday morning, Martin said.
She said she hopes the next judgment will be the final one.
While Sweet said Friday’s ruling was a “setback,” she called for a swift resolution ahead of the Tuesday deadline.
“Our fight to ensure that voters — not politicians — have the final say is far from over,” she said.
Friday’s ruling was not the only legal proceeding regarding Amendment 3 this week. Proponents of the measure had sued Ashcroft, the secretary of state, over his proposed language summarizing the measure that said a “yes” vote would “enshrine the right to abortion at any time of pregnancy in the Missouri Constitution” and bar any abortion regulation.
Abortion rights groups said that was misleading, adding that the state could still regulate abortion after viability if the amendment passes. On Thursday, a different judge on the Cole County Circuit agreed with those groups, ruling that Aschroft’s language was “unfair, insufficient, inaccurate and misleading and is hereby vacated.”
The judge ruled the summary would have to follow one previously written by an appeals court that he said was “fair.” That language notes that, if the measure passes, some abortion regulation would be allowed and abortion could be banned after fetal viability.
Antiabortion groups outside Missouri have also filed legal challenges seeking to remove abortion measures from November ballots. Many of those cases have already made their way through court, though some are ongoing.
Arizona’s top court, for example, ruled last month that Proposition 139 was legal and could appear on the ballot after abortion rights groups collected about 578,000 signatures in support of the measure that would enshrine the right to an abortion in the state’s constitution. A South Dakota measure survived a legal challenge to appear on the ballot, though a trial over its validity is scheduled for the end of September, the Searchlight news outlet reported.
Meanwhile:
The percentage of people who say they’ve tried to end a pregnancy without medical assistance increased after the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade. That’s according to a study published Tuesday in the online journal JAMA Network Open.
Tia Freeman, a reproductive health organizer, leads workshops for Tennesseans on how to safely take medication abortion pills outside of medical settings.
Abortion is almost entirely illegal in Tennessee. Freeman, who lives near Nashville, said people planning to stop pregnancies have all sorts of reasons for wanting to do so without help from the formal health care system — including the cost of traveling to another state, challenge of finding child care, and fear of lost wages.
“Some people, it’s that they don’t have the support networks in their families where they would need to have someone drive them to a clinic and then sit with them,” said Freeman, who works for Self-Managed Abortion; Safe and Supported, a U.S.-based project of Women Help Women, an international nonprofit that advocates for abortion access.
In the JAMA study, women who self-managed abortion attempts reported using a range of methods, including using drugs or alcohol, lifting heavy objects, and taking a hot bath. In addition, about 22% reported hitting themselves in the stomach. Nearly 4% reported inserting an object in their body.
The term “self-managed abortion” may conjure images of back-alley procedures from the 1950s and ’60s. Since Roe’s end, more than 20 states have banned or further restricted abortion.
