This week, the Arizona Supreme Court said that the use of the term “fetus” does not violate a state law requiring bipartisan language in pamphlets explaining the state's ballot propositions. The Supreme Court's decision overturns a lower court ruling that found a pamphlet explaining Arizona's abortion access law was biased for referring to a “fetus” instead of a “product of conception” as a fetus.
The Supreme Court recognizes the term “fair”
In July, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Christopher Whitten ruled that the term was “loaded with emotive and partisan overtones” and ordered that state documents describing the ballot measure be changed to more “neutral” language. The state Supreme Court disagreed, ruling that the language “substantially complies” with the fairness requirement because it's already used in state law.
“We conclude that the analysis provides the information required by ARS § 19-124(C) and 'substantially complies' with the statute's fairness requirements,” the court ruled.
The state's ballot initiative seeks to legalize abortion at any stage of pregnancy. Currently, abortion is legal up to the 15th week of pregnancy under a provision of a law passed this year. Abortion was banned under an 1864 law after Roe v. Wade was overturned, but the new law includes an exception in cases where the mother's life is at risk.
Both sides react
The ruling stunned supporters of the referendum, including Arizona Advocates for Abortion Access (AAA), which challenged the wording of the referendum's information pamphlet, which they said would expose voters to “biased, politically charged language created not by experts but by anti-abortion special interests to manipulate and misinform voters.”
“This decision is beyond disgraceful,” said Athena Salman of the Arizona reproductive freedom group Reproductive Freedom for All Arizona, “but we know that no matter what dirty tricks they try to pull to slow us down, Arizonans will show up to the polls in November and demand their freedom.”
Arizona Right to Life, on the other hand, argues that the referendum should never have taken place in the first place. They claim that the people who circulated the petitions to put the referendum on the ballot used fraudulent practices when gathering signatures. Arizona Right to Life is challenging the petitions in court. According to their website:
Arizona Right to Life claims that a number of paid spokespeople have misled and deceived the public by giving varying accounts of the movement's goals, including contradictory statements about when abortion restrictions would be implemented and failing to articulate language about the viability of fetuses.
Much of the debate over this issue in Arizona seems to be about the grammar of abortion: The question is whether killing a baby is a good idea.
