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Abortion in Michigan is legal throughout pregnancy. A state constitutional amendment to explicitly guarantee abortion rights was placed on the ballot in 2022 as Michigan Proposal 22–3; it passed with 57 percent of the vote, adding the right to abortion and contraceptive use to the
Michigan Constitution The Constitution of the State of Michigan is the governing document of the U.S. state of Michigan. It describes the structure and function of the state's government. There have been four constitutions approved by the people of Michigan. The fi ...
. The amendment largely prevents the regulation of abortion before fetal viability, unless said regulations are to protect the individual seeking an abortion, and it also makes it unconstitutional to make laws restricting abortions which would protect the life and health, physical and/or mental, of the pregnant individual seeking abortion.


History


Legislative history

In the 19th century, bans by state legislatures on abortion were about protecting the life of the mother given the number of deaths caused by abortions; state governments saw themselves as looking out for the lives of their citizens. In 1931, a law, Section 750.14, was passed that made abortion illegal in the state. By the end of the 19th century, all states in the Union except Louisiana had therapeutic exceptions in their legislative bans on abortions. In 2006, the parents of
Becky Bell Rebecca Suzanne "Becky" Bell (August 24, 1971 – September 16, 1988) was an American teenage girl who died of complications from a septic abortion. After becoming pregnant, Bell inquired about a legal abortion but was hindered by Indiana state ...
, a girl whose death was related to the existence of parental consent rules, testified before the Michigan House of Representatives in opposition to a pending parental consent law. The state was one of 23 states in 2007 to have a detailed abortion-specific informed consent requirement. Michigan was the only state with a detailed informed consent statute that provided women seeking abortions on the state website with information about pregnancy relative to how far along the woman is. Georgia, Michigan, Arkansas and Idaho all required in 2007 that women must be provided by an abortion clinic with the option to view an image their fetus if an ultrasound is used prior to the abortion taking place. Michigan was the only state of the 23 with written informed consent materials that did not require abortion providers to give patients information about abortion alternatives. In 2013, state Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) law applied to medication induced abortions in addition to abortion clinics. The state legislature was one of ten states nationwide that tried to unsuccessfully pass a fetal heartbeat bill in 2018.  Only Iowa successfully passed such a bill, but it was struck down by the courts. In May 2019, the Republican dominated state Legislature passed HB 4320-4321 and SB 229-230 which banned dilation and evacuation abortions. They specified criminal sentences of two years for anyone who performed this type of abortion procedure. The legislation passed 22–16 in the Senate and 58–51 in the House. Michigan Governor
Gretchen Whitmer Gretchen Esther Whitmer (; born August 23, 1971) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the 49th governor of Michigan since 2019. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, she served in the Michigan House of R ...
promised to veto the legislation and any similar legislation attempting to ban abortions in the state. As of May 14, 2019, the state prohibited abortions after the fetus was viable, generally some point between week 24 and 28. This period uses a standard defined by the US Supreme Court in 1973 with the ''
Roe v. Wade ''Roe v. Wade'', 410 U.S. 113 (1973),. was a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Constitution of the United States protected the right to have an ...
'' ruling. In 2022, an activist group called Reproductive Freedom for All started a
ballot initiative A popular initiative (also citizens' initiative) is a form of direct democracy by which a petition meeting certain hurdles can force a legal procedure on a proposition. In direct initiative, the proposition is put directly to a plebiscite o ...
, which sought to enshrine the right to abortion, among other pregnancy related matters, in the Michigan Constitution. On July 11, 753,759 signatures were submitted to get the proposed amendment on the ballot in the November general election. The signatures were verified by the Bureau of Elections who recommended that it be included on the ballot, but the Board of State Canvassers deadlocked along party lines, preventing the initiative from moving forward. The Republican members of the board claimed the initiative to be invalid due to formatting errors. The matter was appealed to the Michigan Supreme Court. On September 8, the state supreme court ruled in favor of the ballot initiative, and on the following day, a meeting of the Board of State Canvassers unanimously certified the initiative. The proposal was passed 57% to 43%, adding the right to abortion and contraceptive use to the Michigan constitution. A 1931 law, Section 750.14, criminalized abortion except when the pregnant person's life was in danger, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in ''
Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization ''Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization'', 597 U.S. 215 (2022), is a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court in which the court held ...
'' would have allowed that law to go back into effect, but on September 7, 2022, a Michigan Court of Claims judge ruled that that law violated the Michigan Constitution. The law was ruled null and voided due to the 2022 amendment, and it was formally repealed by statute on April 5, 2023.


Judicial history

The US Supreme Court's decision in 1973's ''
Roe v. Wade ''Roe v. Wade'', 410 U.S. 113 (1973),. was a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Constitution of the United States protected the right to have an ...
'' ruling meant the state could no longer regulate abortion in the first trimester. However, the Supreme Court overturned ''Roe v. Wade'' in ''
Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization ''Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization'', 597 U.S. 215 (2022), is a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court in which the court held ...
'', later in 2022. On September 7, 2022, Judge Elizabeth Gleicher invalidated a law from 1931 that criminalized abortion in Michigan unless the mother's life was in danger. From the ruling: :“A law denying safe, routine medical care not only denies women of their ability to control their bodies and their lives — it denies them of their dignity... Michigan’s Constitution forbids this violation of due process.” it "...forces a pregnant woman to forgo her reproductive choices and to instead serve as `an involuntary vessel entitled to no more respect than other forms of collectively owned property,’” Judge Gleicher had previously issued an injunction of the 1931 law in May 2022; the Michigan Court of Appeals later ruled that it only applied to state prosecutors, but not county prosecutors. Gleicher's September 2022 decision applies to both sets of prosecutors. On June 25, 2024, a Michigan Court of Claims judge suspended Michigan's 24-hour waiting period, informed consent counseling law and ban on advanced practice clinicians performing abortions, stating that the laws were no longer enforceable under 2022 Michigan Proposal 3.


Clinic history

Between 1982 and 1992, the number of abortion clinics in the state decreased by thirteen, going from 83 in 1982 to 70 in 1992. In 2014, there were twenty abortion clinics in the state. In 2014, 89% of the counties in the state did not have an abortion clinic. That year, 40% of women in the state aged 15–44 lived in a county without an abortion clinic. In March 2016, there were 21
Planned Parenthood The Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc. (PPFA), or simply Planned Parenthood, is an American nonprofit organization
clinics in the state. In 2017, there were 19 Planned Parenthood clinics, 8 of which offered abortion services, in a state with a population of 2,209,248 women aged 15–49.


Amendment text


Statistics

Between 1893 and 1932, there were 156 indictments and 40 convictions of women for having abortions. In 1990, 1,157,000 women in the state faced the risk of an unintended pregnancy. In 2010, the state had seven publicly funded abortions, of which were seven federally funded and zero were state funded. In 2013, among white women aged 15–19, there were 1,460 abortions, 1,700 abortions for black women aged 15–19, 130 abortions for Hispanic women aged 15–19, and 90 abortions for women of all other races. In 2014, 54% of adults said in a poll by the
Pew Research Center The Pew Research Center (also simply known as Pew) is a nonpartisan American think tank based in Washington, D.C. It provides information on social issues, public opinion, and demographic trends shaping the United States and the world. It ...
that abortion should be legal in all or most cases while 42% believe it should be illegal in all or most cases. The 2023 American Values Atlas reported that, in their most recent survey, 63% of people from Michigan said that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. In 2017, the state had an infant mortality rate of 6.8 deaths per 1,000 live births. In 2017, there were 1,777 dilation and evacuation procedures among the 26,594 total abortions performed in Michigan that year.


Illegal and unsafe abortion deaths

In the period between 1972 and 1974, the state had an illegal abortion mortality rate per million women aged 15–44 of between 0.1 and 0.9. In 2005, the ''
Detroit News ''The Detroit News'' is one of the two major newspapers in the U.S. city of Detroit, Michigan. The paper began in 1873, when it rented space in the rival ''Detroit Free Press'' building. ''The News'' absorbed the ''Detroit Tribune'' on February ...
'' reported that a 16-year-old boy beat his pregnant, under-age girlfriend with a bat at her request to abort a fetus. The young couple lived in Michigan, where
parental consent Parental consent legislation, laws (also known as parental involvement laws) in some countries require that one or more parents consent to or be notified before their Minor (law), minor child can legally engage in certain activities. Parental con ...
is required to receive an abortion.


Pro-Abortion rights views and activities


Views

Sen.
Winnie Brinks Winnie Brinks (born February 17, 1968) is an American politician who has served as a member of the Michigan Senate since 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, Brinks assumed office as Majority Leader of the Senate on January 1, 2023; she is t ...
(D-Grand Rapids) said during a hearing on the 2019 proposed abortion legislation, "Nearly 99% of abortions occur before 21 weeks, but when they are needed later in pregnancy, it is often in very complex circumstances, the kinds of situations where a woman and her doctor need every medical option available. ..In fact, abortions later in pregnancy often involve rare, severe fetal abnormalities, and serious risks to women's health." Sen.
Erika Geiss Erika Geiss is a Democratic politician from Michigan currently representing the 1st Senate district. Geiss previously represented the 6th senate district. Biography Geiss is the granddaughter of Afro-Panamanian immigrants. She attended Bran ...
(D-Taylor) said during the same debate, "I can stand here and call out the hypocrisy of predominantly male legislators — most of whom, with zero medical background — who somehow decided when they took office that they are medical experts and experts of women's bodies and health care."


Protests

Women from the state participated in marches supporting abortion rights as part of a #StoptheBans movement in May 2019. Following the overturn of Roe v. Wade on June 24, 2022, abortion rights protests took place in
Ann Arbor Ann Arbor is a city in Washtenaw County, Michigan, United States, and its county seat. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851, making it the List of municipalities in Michigan, fifth-most populous cit ...
and Detroit with
Click on Detroit WDIV-TV (channel 4) is a television station in Detroit, Michigan, United States, affiliated with NBC. It serves as the flagship broadcast property of the Graham Media Group subsidiary of Graham Holdings Company. WDIV-TV maintains studio faciliti ...
counting nearly 1,000 participants. Around 200 abortion rights protestors demonstrated at the Michigan State Capitol in Lansing. Abortion rights protests were also held in Grand Rapids and Kalamazoo. On July 11, 2022, Reproductive Freedom For All submitted 753,759 signatures for their petition to get a proposed abortion rights amendment on the ballot in the November 2022 general election.


Violence

A 74-year-old man shot an 84-year-old woman on September 20, 2022. She was campaigning against Michigan's Proposition 3 which sought to make abortion a constitutional right in the state of Michigan. She survived and she received medical treatment for her wound after driving to a nearby police department. The man claimed he accidentally shot her. Prosecutors from Ionia County later charged him on September 30 with one count of felonious assault, careless discharge of a gun causing injury and reckless use of a firearm. He has been released on $10,000 bond. The pro-abortion militant group Jane's Revenge has accepted responsibility for acts of vandalism aimed at anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers. The organization has been linked with vandalization on the building which hosts Jackson Right to Life and the office of Congressman
Tim Walberg Timothy Lee Walberg (born April 12, 1951) is an American politician serving as a United States House of Representatives, U.S. representative from Michigan since 2011, representing the state's Michigan's 5th congressional district, 5th congression ...
. Other acts of vandalism in Michigan have been suspected to have the involvement of Jane's Revenge, such as vandalization of the Lennon Pregnancy Center in Dearborn Heights on June 23, 2022, the pregnancy center Pregnancy Aid Detroit in Eastpointe on December 19, 2022, as well as the home of one of the board members the same day.


Anti-abortion activities and views


Views

The
Democrats for Life of America Democrats for Life of America (DFLA) is a 501(c)(4) American political advocacy nonprofit organization that seeks to elect anti-abortion Democrats and to encourage the Democratic Party to oppose euthanasia, capital punishment, and abortion. DFLA ...
are a group of anti-abortion Democrats on the
political left Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy either as a whole or of certain social hierarchies. Left-wing politi ...
who advocate for an anti-abortion plank in the Democratic Party's platform and for anti-abortion Democratic candidates. Former vice-presidential candidate
Sargent Shriver Robert Sargent Shriver Jr. (November 9, 1915 – January 18, 2011) was an American diplomat, politician, and activist. He was a member of the Shriver family by birth, and a member of the Kennedy family through his marriage to Eunice Kennedy. ...
, the late Robert Casey, a former two-term governor of
Pennsylvania Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...
, and former Rep.
Bart Stupak Bartholomew Thomas Stupak (; born February 29, 1952) is an American politician and lobbyist. A member of the Democratic Party, Stupak served as the U.S. representative from from 1993 to 2011. Stupak chose not to seek re-election in 2010. He de ...
(D-Mich), a former leader of the bipartisan anti-abortion caucus in the
United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Artic ...
, have been among the most well-known anti-abortion Democrats. However, following his vote in favor of the
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act A patient is any recipient of health care services that are performed by healthcare professionals. The patient is most often ill or injured and in need of treatment by a physician, nurse, optometrist, dentist, veterinarian, or other health ...
, Marjorie Dannenfelser of the SBA List reported that her organization was revoking an anti-abortion award it had been planning to give to Stupak, and
anti-abortion organizations Anti-abortion movements, also self-styled as pro-life movements, are involved in the abortion debate advocating against the practice of abortion and its Abortion by country, legality. Many anti-abortion movements began as countermovements in r ...
accused Stupak of having betrayed the anti-abortion movement.


Violence

There was an arson attack at an abortion clinic in 1981 in Michigan that caused US$57,000 in damage. On September 11, 2006, David McMenemy of Rochester Hills, Michigan, crashed his car into the Edgerton Women's Care Center in Davenport, Iowa. He then doused the lobby in gasoline and started a fire. McMenemy committed these acts in the belief that the center was performing abortions; however, Edgerton is not an abortion clinic. ''Time'' magazine listed the incident in a "Top 10 Inept Terrorist Plots" list. On July 31, 2022, an anti-abortion protester set a Planned Parenthood building on fire in Kalamazoo, Michigan. A suspect was charged with arson of an organization receiving federal funding. According to investigators the suspect posted videos on
YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
railing against abortion and other topics. After pleading guilty to arson the man was sentenced to 5 years in prison.


References

{{Abortion by US state
Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...
Healthcare in Michigan Women in Michigan