Coming to TN in 2014: The Abortion Debate
On Friday, the Tennessee House voted to put an amendment regarding abortion on the ballot for 2014. Per the Chattanooga Times-Free Press:
The vote was 76-18 to approve Senate Joint Resolution 127, which is intended to nullify a 2000 Tennessee Supreme Court ruling and give state lawmakers the ability to impose some restrictions on abortions allowable under federal rulings.
Now we know what we’ll be talking about after the 2012 election.
Ballot measures are confusing beasts. I’ve worked on several of them. While they do allow the populace to decide controversial issues, they are awful, terrible campaigns to work.
Why? Because depending on the wording of the amendment, you have to conduct an information campaign on voting YES or NO. That’s after you manage to get people aware of the issue and motivated to go to the polls.
So how does this amendment measure up? Here’s the actual wording (via the TFP):
“Nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion. The people retain the right through their elected state representatives and state senators to enact, amend, or repeal statutes regarding abortion, including, but not limited to, circumstances of pregnancy resulting from rape or incest or when necessary to save the life of the mother.”
It was designed to challenge a 2000 Tennessee Supreme Court ruling that said under the state constitution, there are more “rights” to abortion than under the U.S. Constitution. According to Life News:
Harris said the 2000 ruling in Planned Parenthood of Middle Tennessee v. Sundquist made it so “common sense protections were immediately stripped from state law books including informed consent for women considering abortion, a 48 hour waiting period and a requirement that second and third trimester abortions be performed in regulated hospitals rather than out-patient abortion facilities.”
Subsequently the 2000 ruling was also used as precedent to strike state law requiring the inspection, regulation and licensure of abortion facilities in Tennessee, he explained. All of those pro-life protections — which have reduced abortions in some states by as much as 50 percent — could be restored if the amendment is approved.
According to a source at Americans United for Life, this ballot measure is a good thing. Since this ballot measure would effectively overturn a decision made by judicial activism, I have a feeling that money from both sides of this issue will pour into the state in early 2014.
What’s the strategy?
Notice the year. This will be on the ballot during a mid-term cycle rather than a presidential. (I’m uncertain if this was required by law or a choice of the Republican-majority state legislature.) That automatically makes the ballot measure more favorable to the pro-life side since older people are more pro-life and are more dependable voters.
This also piggybacks on data released today from Gallup on views on abortion, which deserves it’s own post.
According to the poll, 51% of Americans consider abortion morally wrong. Also, half of all Americans also believe that abortion should only be legal under certain conditions, but doesn’t specify those conditions (i.e. illegal except for rape, incest or life of mother vs. partial-birth abortion ban).
Since Tennessee is solidly conservative in the east and gets more liberal as you move west, I predict that our friends from Jackson to Memphis, as well as folks in the Metro Nashville area, will be targeted by the pro-abortion side. While Davidson County will probably vote NO, surrounding counties are likely to be a toss-up.
That means East Tennesseans will be called upon by pro-life groups to vote en masse to bolster the YES votes. Chattanooga, in particular, will probably be the focus on the life side, since we’re one of the largest cities in the country without an abortion clinic (an amazing story). There’s a strong pro-life community in the Scenic City, and I anticipate we’ll be called on to knock on doors and get out the vote in the fall of 2014.
I sense a long and nasty fight on the road to 2014.
