Anti-abortion sentiment in Mississippi is a powerful force that has limited the procedure to a single clinic in Jackson.
Still, some of the state's most reliable pro-life voices have expressed misgivings about Initiative 26, the proposition to be decided by the state's voters Tuesday that would declare a fertilized human egg to be a legal person, even if it puts the mother's life at risk.
The aim of the Colorado-based group behind the amendment is clear -- to develop a challenge to the Supreme Court's 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed a woman's right to abortion.
Meanwhile, as that legal argument lingers, every woman who becomes pregnant, even as a result of rape or incest, would lose her autonomy, no longer able to decide whether to carry the fetus to term.
Not only abortion rights but some forms of birth control would become murder if this amendment passes.
Such government intrusion into individual rights could exert a chilling effect on the treatment of ectopic pregnancies and other situations in which the life of the mother is in danger.
What supporters of the "Personhood Amendment" are asking of Mississippi voters, in effect, is to trust government officials to use good judgment in every decision regarding the prosecution of anyone whose decisions might affect an embryo.
IUDs and "morning-after pills" would be outlawed, along with the destruction of embryos created in laboratories, hampering the in vitro fertilization process that has brought children into the lives of infertile couples.
"Personhood" status would be granted to a fertilized egg that -- like most fertilized eggs -- would never become attached to the uterus and therefore would have no chance of becoming a human life.
This ambiguity has discouraged a number of religious groups, including the Catholic Diocese of Jackson, from endorsing the measure.
It left doubts in Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour's mind as he was deciding this week whether to vote yes or no.
Barbour eventually cast an absentee ballot for Initiative 26, a few days after saying that the unintended consequences of the amendment are a legitimate concern.
"I'll have to say that I have heard those concerns and they give me some pause," Barbour said.
No doubt many Mississippians of good conscience and good will feel the same.
Source: http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2011/nov/05/editorials-ambiguity-on-the-ballot/?partner=RSS
Source: http://kwindur.blogspot.com/2011/11/editorial-ambiguity-on-ballot.html
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