Mississippi to vote on “fetal personhood”

Mississippi residents will vote Nov. 8 on whether their state should declare that life begins at fertilization, the New York Times reports.

Ballot Initiative 26 asks, "Should the term `person' be defined to include every human being from the moment of fertilization, cloning, or the equivalent thereof?" WAPT TV in Jackson, Miss., reports.

According to the New York Times:

The amendment in Mississippi would ban virtually all abortions, including those resulting from rape or incest. It would bar some birth control methods, including IUDs and “morning-after pills,” which prevent fertilized eggs from implanting in the uterus.

“This is the most extreme in a field of extreme anti-abortion measures that have been before the states this year,” Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, a legal advocacy group, told the New York Times.

The amendment has been endorsed by Democratic and Republican candidates for governor, the New York Times reports.

According to Salon:

Personhood amendments were once considered too radical for the mainstream pro-life movement, but in the most conservative state in the country, with an energized, church-mobilized grass roots, Mississippi could well be the first state to pass one.

Supporters said the amendment is needed to protect human life. "There is a moment when the chromosomes from a woman and the chromosomes from a man unite and form a unique, new individual," Stephen Crampton, an attorney who works for works for Florida-based Liberty Counsel, said in a recent debate at the Mississippi College School of Law, according to WAPT TV. "As a society, it becomes incumbent upon us to take steps to recognize that fact and then to implement laws to protect it."

Critics said that even if the amendment is ultimately declared unconstitutional, it could disrupt care, the New York Times reports.

Some scientists said the amendment makes little sense. Most fertilized eggs do not implant in the uterus or develop further, Dr. Randall S. Hines, a fertility specialist in Jackson who’s working against Proposition 26, told the New York Times. “Once you recognize that the majority of fertilized eggs don’t become people, then you recognize how absurd this amendment is,” he said.

There are similar initiatives in the works in half a dozen other states including Florida and Ohio, the New York Times reports.