State battles over abortion are leading to state constitutional amendments [View all]

[RandySF]

The battles over abortion – who can get one, when they can get one – largely shifted from a focus on the U.S. Supreme Court back to state lawmakers and judges in June 2022. That’s when the Supreme Court ruled that there was no federal constitutional guarantee of the right to get an abortion. States, they said, should be making the rules.

That decision, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, has meant a lot of activity in the past year in both state legislatures and courts. Two contradictory rulings early in April 2023 about whether women should have access to mifepristone, one of the two kinds of prescription abortion pills typically taken together for abortion, make it clear that federal courts still play a role in abortion policymaking. But states remain an important battleground.

Many people following the abortion battle focus on the part that state courts and state supreme court elections play. The intense focus on the outcome of the April 4, 2023, Wisconsin Supreme Court election, which shifted ideological control of that court, is an example.

I am a political scientist whose research focuses on state constitutions. I follow state constitutional amendments, which are adopted on a regular basis and revise the language of state constitutions. Sometimes they add new provisions. At other times they modify existing provisions. These amendments shape abortion policy as much as state court rulings – and stand to play a big role in abortion rights in the future.




https://www.penncapital-star.com/commentary/state-battles-over-abortion-are-leading-to-state-constitutional-amendments-analysis/