Will the constitutional amendment proposed by Dakotans for Health to reëstablish women’s right to abortion pass muster with South Dakota voters? A new poll by Mason-Dixon Polling and Strategy for South Dakota News Watch and the Chiesman Center for Democracy suggest restoring Roe v. Wade has a shot among South Dakota voters:
The poll of 500 registered voters showed that a majority (57%) of respondents support allowing legal access to abortion medications in the state, including 42% who “strongly support” such access. Nearly two-thirds (65%) said they support having a statewide referendum to determine South Dakota’s laws regarding reproductive rights.
More than three-fourths (76%) of those polled support allowing legal abortion in cases of rape and incest, an exception not currently allowed under South Dakota’s laws, among the most restrictive in the nation following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe vs. Wade in June.
…The poll also showed that nearly 8 in 10 respondents (79%) oppose criminal penalties for anyone who helps a South Dakota resident obtain an abortion where it is legal, such as in a neighboring state. An overwhelming majority (71%) also support permitting South Dakota residents to leave the state to obtain abortions [Stu Whitney, “New Poll: Majority of South Dakotans Oppose Total Ban on Abortion and Want Voters, Not Lawmakers, to Make the Rules,” South Dakota News Watch, 2022.08.16].
Mason-Dixon did not ask voters if they support the specific amendment that Dakotans for Health hopes voters will place on the 2024 ballot. But this poll does make clear that a big majority of South Dakotans want the chance to vote on the right to abortion. If they get this chance—i.e., if they sign the initiative petition that will start circulating this November 5—this poll indicates many of them will be inclined to restore the constitutional framework that for 49 years protected legal access to medication abortion, abortion in cases of rape and incest, and travel to obtain reproductive health services not available in South Dakota.
“(71%) also support permitting South Dakota residents to leave the state…..” It does not matter what purpose one has in leaving onbe state for another. Our tight to roam freely about the country to engage in endeavors that are perfectly legal in our destination is the right to “liberty” (among others) guaranteed by our US constitution. It is disturbing to me that ANYONE in this state – let alone 29% of us – seem to recognize a “right to life”, but not a right to liberty.
In the end the people will decide. The disconnect between the legislature and what citizens want is notable.
Indeed, Mr. Schriever. This poll blogging is in lockstep with grudznick’s thoughts. To complete the quoting you cut short:
grudznick would take it further by stopping right where you did as well, and support people just leaving in general.
I wonder how the numbers on the polls would change if pollsters, the media or anyone else told folks what the plain language of the South Dakota 1st degree murder statute said: SDCL 22-16-4 (“Homicide is murder in the first degree: (1) If perpetrated without authority of law and with a premeditated design to effect the death of . . . an unborn child. . . . “). And that 1st degree murder is punishable by mandatory life in prison, or by the death penalty if there is a statutotry “aggravating circumstrance” such as defined by SDCL 23A-27A-1(6) (“. . . any of the following aggravating circumstances which may be supported by the evidence: . . . the victim is less than thirteen years of age;”). I would hope that knowledge of the State’s new power to impose the death sentence on a woman and anyone that helps her terminate her pregnancy, which under SD law cannot no longer be done under “authority of law” at any time after conception, might result in even higher numbers of individuals supporting bringing the concepts of Roe back to South Dakota.
But, then again, I must be misreading reading these statutes, and existing case law permitting multiple convictions under different statutes for a single act, since there seems to be no other voice in South Dakota or nationally raising these concerns. I would be very glad to be wrong but it would sure be reassuring if someone, anyone, could simply point out the reasons for the obvious nature of my mistake in reading these South Dakota murder statutes and existing case law.