Pro-life physicians seek to affirm constitutionality of Mississippi’s elective abortion ban

• The American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists are asking the Mississippi Supreme Court to overrule its 1998 Fordice decision.

On Monday, the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists (AAPLOG) announced that they had filed an appellate brief asking the Mississippi Supreme Court to overrule its 1998 decision in Pro-Choice Mississippi v. Fordice and affirm the constitutionality of Mississippi’s elective abortion ban.

A Hinds County judge ruled that AAPLOG members did not have standing to pursue the overturning of the Fordice case last year.

With this appeal of the chancery court order that dismissed its case, AAPLOG is seeking to clarify whether Mississippi considers elective abortion a crime or a constitutional right.

AAPLOG is being represented by American Dream Legal, a newly formed public interest law firm headed up by Aaron Rice.

“The people of Mississippi enacted a law that protected unborn life and took down the U.S. Supreme Court’s abuse of judicial authority in Roe v. Wade,” Rice said in a statement announcing the filing, a reference to the Dobbs decision in 2022. “It is only fitting that we likewise put an end to efforts by the courts in our own state to impose abortion policy by judicial fiat.”

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization arose out of a challenge to a 2018 Mississippi law, the Gestational Age Act, which prevented abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Following the Dobbs decision which overturned Roe, a “trigger” law took effect outlawing most abortions in Mississippi, with exceptions to protect the life of the mother and in the case of pregnancy resulting from rape.

AAPLOG argues that the 1998 Fordice decision, which held that Mississippi’s own state constitution protects a right to abortion, conflicts with the overturning of Roe and the current law outlawing abortion in Mississippi.

AAPLOG also believes Mississippi’s criminal ban on the performance of or referral for elective abortion directly conflicts with the Fordice decision, rendering the legal framework governing physicians’ conduct incoherent.

“AAPLOG physicians are caught between conflicting legal duties: refer patients and risk prosecution under state law—or refuse to refer and risk professional ruin,” the group states.

The lawsuit seeks judicial resolution by the Mississippi Supreme Court of that conflict before they are forced to choose.

Whether the state high court will consider the appeal remains uncertain as the question of standing remains at issue.

You can read the appeal here.