Topic: Abortion & State Constitutions – Peace and Life Referendums

No to Abortion

OR

Ensure Right to Abortion

Amendments

plus one protecting people from euthanasia

Since the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade, saying there’s no right to abortion in the federal U.S. constitution, there’s been a flurry of states wanting to address abortion in their state constitutions.

No to Abortion:

For November 8, 2022, a “No Right to Abortion” amendment was voted on in Kentucky, and failed. It was also defeated in Kansas August 2. 2022.

This approach has a 100% failure rate since Dobbs. Yet it had a 100% success rate pre-Dobbs. Alabama, West Virginia, Tennessee and Louisiana passed similar amendments. Both of the ones that failed were set to go on the ballot before the Dobbs decision came down. The pro-life successes of November 2024 (see below) involved defeating pro-abortion amendments rather than passing pro-life ones.

Nebraska had a proposed amendment which responded to the ensure-abortion in that state. It passed, and the pro-abortion one failed. It only prohibits after the first trimester, consistent with current state law. But it still allows for earlier bans later, as public sentiment improves.

Ensure Abortion:

This passed in California, Michigan, and Vermont in November, 2022, and in Ohio in November 2023.

For the many in November 2024:

States in which the legal status of abortion won’t change since it’s already legal with no plans for that to change, and the measures did pass in 2024: Maryland, Montana, Nevada, and New York. It has to pass a second time in Nevada before it’s added to the constitution.

States in which this passing would have overturned some form of ban, but it failed: Florida, Nebraska, and South Dakota.

States that passed it and this will interfere with current bans: Arizona and Missouri.

In Colorado, the change to allow funding passed.

Washington has legislation introduced that may or may not be going anywhere in later years.

Protection against Medically Assisted Suicide

West Virginia just barely passed this in November 2024.

The Future

Only 26 of the 50 states allow for petition drives to put measures on the ballot. The states that ban abortion and provide for such drives to put state constitutional amendments on the ballot that haven’t yet had such drives are: Mississippi, North Dakota, and Oklahoma. Idaho has a ban and allows for a statute to be put on the ballot by petition. Utah has what is not a ban but a gestational restriction, and it allows statutes by petition. In Arkansas, petitions were turned in in 2024, but the secretary of state declared the paperwork wasn’t in order and the state supreme court agreed; they may try again.

Therefore, the amount of future petition drives that the pro-life movement will need to contend with is rather limited.

However, there’s a case to be made that since the energy behind the petition drives in the 2023-2024 election cycle is a backlash to the Dobbs decision, the energy for future drives in states that haven’t had them yet – or in the state (Arkansas) that needed more signatures than they gathered – may dissipate. Already, the abortion funds that raise money for abortions for low-income women are having a steep decline in donations. Eventually, the backlash is likely to subside as people turn their attention to other issues.

Additionally, one of the ideas behind the many amendments of November 2024 is that it would help Democrats win by getting people to the polls out of excitement for the amendment, voters who would then vote for the Democrats while they were there. This turned out to be a failed strategy. Many people voted both for the amendments and for Republicans. And Democratic turnout was lower than expected. Therefore, one of the major motivations for putting these on the ballot won’t apply in the future.

Short Videos for Social Media

Louisiana passed a no-right-to-abortion amendment by a vote of 63% on November 3, 2020. The videos below are all specific to the Louisiana referendum, but the reasoning can be used and adapted to any of the campaigns.

This is also an example of a good way to use social media for elections: a variety of people made videos of around a minute each, from a wide variety of perspectives in order to suit the fancy of voters of differing interests. We include just a few. This should be effective for any campaign on any issue, not limited to this one.