Missouri Defeats Pro-Life Amendment to Save Babies From Abortions

Article By Steven Ertelt 

Missouri voters rejected a constitutional amendment Tuesday that would have repealed the state’s 2024 right to abortion and restored protections for unborn babies.

With 91.1 percent of precincts reporting, “No” led 55.45 percent to 44.55 percent on Amendment 3. The measure would have eliminated the constitutional right to abortion approved by voters two years ago, restricted abortion to cases of medical emergency, fetal anomaly, rape or incest, and limited the rape and incest exceptions to the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.

It also would have enshrined a ban on mutilating children with so-called sex change procedures for minors in the state constitution.

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The 2024 amendment, which passed with 51.6 percent of the vote, legalized essentially up to birth and overturned Missouri’s abortion ban that took effect after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway said the 2024 amendment “made abortion legal right up until the moment of birth” with “absolutely no safeguards for the health of the mother, and certainly not for the safety of the baby.”

She noted that after its passage, abortion supporters “litigated successfully all the previous safety measures that were in place.”

Hanaway described Amendment 3 as including exceptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother while allowing lawmakers to protect both the unborn and women. “I know a lot of people would like to have a total ban, but this will save millions of babies of lives if we can get it passed,” she said.

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said the 2024 amendment put the issue “beyond the reach of the legislature.” Amendment 3, he said, “protects the unborn to a very large degree, but it allows the legislature to continue to address this issue.”

The Catholic bishops of Missouri urged voters to support the measure, stating, “We cannot be indifferent when our own state constitution fails to safeguard those who most need its protection.”

They called on Missourians to “stand with the unborn child who cannot speak for himself or herself” and “stand with the woman who deserves accompaniment and care, not an unregulated abortion at an unsafe clinic.”

Pre-election polling had shown the measure in a virtual tie.

An October Remington Poll of 684 likely voters found 43 percent support and 43 percent opposition. But the pro-abortion side again spent millions on false ads lying to voters. With the amendment’s defeat, the 2024 constitutional right to kill babies in abortions remains in place.

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