Abortion Foes' New Strategy: Personhood for Embryos

States asked to grant rights to fertilized eggs
By Jason Farago,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 23, 2007 12:55 PM CST
Abortion Foes' New Strategy: Personhood for Embryos
National Clergy Council President Rev. Rob Schenck holds a one-man counter protest, as abortion rights demonstrators protest outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, April 18, 2007, following the court's decision on partial birth abortion. (AP Photo/Lauren Victoria Burke)   (Associated Press)

Tired of waiting for a more right-leaning court to revisit Roe v. Wade, opponents of abortion in several states are adopting a new strategy: constitutional amendments to grant human status to embryos. The LA Times reports on a grass-roots movement to put referendums on state ballots: It faces considerable obstacles but has pro-choice advocates nervous.

Unsupported by larger pro-life organizations, local Colorado activists have gathered enough signatures to ask voters whether the state constitution should afford "any human being from the moment of fertilization" the status of personhood. A court challenge to the referendum has failed; voters will decide in 2008. More prominent abortion foes are skeptical of the plans, but a spokeswoman for the Colorado initiative is unbowed: "We're not banning abortion. We're defining life." (More abortion stories.)

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