Missouri Initiative Would Stop Forced Abortions, Not Ban Them Outright 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
December 11, 2007
Jefferson City, MO (LifeNews.com) — The sponsors of a state ballot initiative in Missouri are speaking up about their proposal and say the media and public have a misconception about what it would do. The initiative has been characterized as an outright ban on abortions when it would only prohibit forcing women to have them.
Previous media reports indicate the Elliot Institute is behind an abortion ban in the state.
Instead, the proposal to help women avoid coerced abortions is being sponsored by the Stop Forced Abortions Alliance, a coalition of groups which submitted the petition initiative to the Secretary of State last month.
The petition is titled he Prevention of Coerced and Unsafe Abortions Act, has been approved for circulation by the Secretary of State’s office.
The office has signed off on the language of the ballot proposal and its supporters must gather the signatures of 90,000 state residents in order to get it on the November 2008 ballot.
Paula Talley, one of the group’s organizers, told LifeNews.com that she knows firsthand what it’s like to be pressured into having an abortion.
Talley says she was forced to have an abortion which went against her moral beliefs by her employer and that her history of sexual abuse and depression likely increased her risk of a severe emotional reaction to it.
"This is a very pro-woman law. If it had been in place in 1980, I would have been spared the years of grief and depression which followed my own unwanted abortion,” she said.
“The abortion counselor never asked if I was being pressured nor did she inquire about my psychological history,” Talley added.
Had she done so, Talley told LifeNews.com, she would have known that Talley really didn’t want the abortion and should have suggested she seek alternatives.
"This law would help to prevent other women from being victims of negligent pre-abortion screening," Talley explained.
The group has released a 22-page report, Forced Abortion in America, that describes the cases of women pressured, coerced, and violently abused into submitting to unwanted abortions. It also includes citations to studies of coerced abortions, including one which found that 64 percent of women having abortion report feeling pressured by others.
Related web sites:
Stop Forced Abortions Alliance – https://www.stopforcedabortions.info
