News & Media

Nov 9, 2011

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Planned Parenthood Advocates of New York celebrates Mississippi’s rejection of ‘personhood’ initiative

‘Thanks to the Mississippi voters, this is a great day for the nation’s women and families.’

(Albany, NY Nov. 9, 2011) Planned Parenthood Advocates of New York today is celebrating the wise choice Mississippi voters made yesterday, protecting the health of the state’s women and families from the peril of a so-called “personhood” amendment. This dangerous initiative would have amended the state constitution to establish legal “personhood” at the moment of fertilization.
 
“Mississippians rejected the amendment because they understand it could have criminalized everything from abortion to common forms of birth control, such as the pill and IUDs,” stressed PPANY President M. Tracey Brooks. “It also could have called into question infertility treatments and causes of miscarriages.”
 
In what is ranked as the most conservative state in the nation, voters of all political persuasions rejected this dangerous measure by an election night margin of  58% to 42%. Mississippi is now the second state to reject “personhood.”  Colorado has defeated the such an amendment twice, in 2008 and 2010.
 
“The continued attempts to roll back women’s health care has mobilized people nationwide against such an extreme agenda,” Brooks said. “This overwhelming defeat quashes supporters’ efforts to legally challenge abortion rights.”
 
With a sound margin of defeat in a state like Mississippi, it is clear that women are engaged and www.WomenAreWatching.org.
 
We congratulate the Mississippians for Healthy Families Coalition, which ran an amazing campaign to educate voters about the dangerous impact of the amendment. Mississippians from all walks of life, medical professionals, clergy, parents, and young women and men, spoke out in opposition to the amendment.
 
Planned Parenthood Advocates of New York is a non-partisan, not-for-profit organization formed as the advocacy and political arm of the Planned Parenthoods of New York State. View a brief video about PPANY’s work, and learn more at http://www.ppany.org/
 
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