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Arizona Proposition 139 is a proposed constitutional amendment that will appear on the ballot on November 5, 2024. If passed, the amendment would establish a right to abortion in the Constitution of Arizona up until fetal viability.[1]
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Right to Abortion Initiative | ||
Text
edit8.1. Fundamental right to abortion; definitions[2]
A. Every individual has a fundamental right to abortion, and the state shall not enact, adopt or enforce any law, regulation, policy or practice that does any of the following:
1. Denies, restricts or interferes with that right before fetal viability unless justified by a compelling state interest that is achieved by the least restrictive means.
2. Denies, restricts or interferes with an abortion after fetal viability that, in the good faith judgment of a treating health care professional, is necessary to protect the life or physical or mental health of the pregnant individual.
3. Penalizes any individual or entity for aiding or assisting a pregnant individual in exercising the individual’s right to abortion as provided in this section.
B. For the purposes of this section:
1. “Compelling state interest” means a law, regulation, policy or practice that meets both of the following:
(a) Is enacted or adopted for the limited purpose of improving or maintaining the health of an individual seeking abortion care, consistent with accepted clinical standards of practice and evidence-based medicine.
(b) Does not infringe on that individual’s autonomous decision making.
2. “Fetal viability” means the point in pregnancy when, in the good faith judgment of a treating health care professional and based on the particular facts of the case, there is a significant likelihood of the fetus’s sustained survival outside the uterus without the application of extraordinary medical measures.
3. “State” means this state, any agency of this state or any political subdivision of this state.
Background
editArizona's abortion laws
editIn the 19th century, bans by state legislatures on abortion were about protecting the life of the mother given the number of deaths caused by abortions; state governments saw themselves as looking out for the lives of their citizens.[3] Arizona's first ban on abortion was passed in 1865.[4] It read:
“[E]very person who shall administer or cause to be administered or taken, any medicinal substances, or shall use or cause to be used any instruments whatever, with the intention to procure the miscarriage of any woman then being with child, and shall be thereof duly convicted, shall be punished by imprisonment in the Territorial prison for a term not less than two years nor more than five years: Provided, that no physician shall be affected by the last clause of this section, who in the discharge of his professional duties, deems it necessary to produce the miscarriage of any woman in order to save her life.”[4]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ "Arizona Proposition 139, Right to Abortion Initiative (2024)". Ballotpedia. Retrieved 12 August 2024.
- ^ "Arizona for Abortion Access". Arizona Secretary of State. Retrieved 12 August 2024.
- ^ Buell, Samuel (1991-01-01). "Criminal Abortion Revisited". New York University Law Review. 66 (6): 1774–1831. PMID 11652642.
- ^ a b Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Org., No. 19-1392, slip op. at 112 (U.S. June 24, 2022).