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Monday, Sept. 26, 2011
Vol. 100 No. 190
Personhood Amendment may not be what you think
FILE PHOTO | The Daily Mississippian
A student discusses Amendment 26 with a protestor from Pro-Life Mississippi last March. Mississippi residents will vote on Amendment 26 this November on the Gubernatorial ballot.
BY JOSH PRESLEY joshpresley551@gmail.com
Mississippi residents will have the chance to vote yes or no on Amendment 26, also known as the Personhood Amendment, in November. The amendment is a citizen’s campaign aimed at making personhood start at the beginning
of conception in the Mississippi Constitution. Personhood Mississippi’s website states that if the majority of the people vote yes in November, abortion will be outlawed in the state. The site also said that human cloning, embryonic stem cell research and other forms of “medical cannibalism” would be effec-
tively stopped. Opponents of the vote claim that not only is this not the case, at least not immediately, but that a vote of yes would have a number of unintended consequences. On the Mississippians for Healthy Families website votenoon26.org, the claim is that the amendment will also effectively ban commonly used forms of contraception that many Mississippi women use, including the pill, the intrauterine device, and ban important technologies that families count on, such as in vitro fertilization. “Yes on 26” Executive Director Brad Prewitt said the rumor that the amendment will lead to prosecution for miscarriages is false and that women were not prosecuted for miscarriages before Roe v. Wade, and personhood will not make a miscarriage a crime. Prewitt also said the Personhood Amendment will not ban hormonal contraceptives, including most forms of birth control pills. “Of course we’re not trying to outlaw all contraception,” he said. “My wife and I have made use of contraception in the past, so it’s not something I’m opposed to.” Prewitt said the forms of contraceptives that will be outlawed are ones that allow conception and then expel the fetus. He also said the Personhood
Amendment will not ban in vitro fertilization. Political science professor John Bruce said he thinks the implications of this vote go much farther than people know. “My hunch is that the politics of it will not play out on the basis of abortion rights,” he said. “It’s all but impossible to get an abortion in Mississippi anyway, so I suspect the argument will play out in terms of unintended consequences and what it does to existing law.” Bruce said there are parts of the law that get very complicated when people have to take into account that the fetus is legally a person. “Let’s say you’re driving home today and a woman pops out from between parked cars and you hit her and she dies,” Bruce said. “Tragic, right? Well, unbeknownst even to her, she became pregnant two weeks ago. By this law, did you just kill two people and do you face two counts of manslaughter?” He said this is not what the people pushing for the amendment intend, but when something previously this undefined is put into law it has implications that are unexpected. Law professor Chris Green said that it isn’t necessarily the case that Roe v. Wade would be effectively negated by the amendment.
“The expectations of some of the proponents of the amendment, and fears of the people criticizing it notwithstanding, this is not really a frontal assault on Roe v. Wade,” Green said. “I read a pro and con list that the Secretary of State’s office put together and on both sides they are really overreading what this would do.” Green said the Personhood Amendment essentially just defines a word and certainly wouldn’t tie the hands of the Mississippi Supreme Court. “Merely saying that isn’t necessarily doing anything with trying to ban abortion,” he said. “Though one thing it’s going to do, I think, is say that from the time of conception human fetuses are included in the wrongful death statute.” The “Yes on 26” website also states that the Personhood Amendment will not directly overturn Roe v. Wade, but it will simply say that the rights of a person begin at conception. Prewitt said that although the vote won’t immediately ban abortion, it is an important first step. “We’re not trying to make antiabortion activists out of everybody,” he said. “I’ve never been to an anti-abortion rally in my life. But this is the great Civil Rights Movement of our generation: the rights of the mother and of the child.”
Trickery not enough for struggling offense in loss to Georgia BY DAVID COLLIER dlcollie@olemiss.edu
After an interesting week filled with rumors, speculation and distraction following the loss to Vanderbilt, the effort by the team improved, but the results were not much better in the 27-13 SEC home-opening loss to the Georgia Bulldogs (2-2, 1-1 SEC). Ole Miss (1-3, 0-2 SEC) ran two trick plays, one a double reverse pass out of the “Wild Rebel” formation and another a reverse handoff on a punt return, that both went for touchdowns. However, mistakes proved costly, as sophomore running back Jeff Scott also had two long touchdowns called back for penalties — just two of the Rebels’ eight penalties for 69 yards in the
inside
game. In all, the Ole Miss offense managed only 183 yards of total offense and eight first downs. “Obviously 183 yards of offense is not enough to win in this conference, or any conference, so we have to improve on that, but I did think there was improvement,” Ole Miss offensive coordinator David Lee said. “I thought our guys fought — (Georgia) won the ball game, but we fought harder this week than last week at Vanderbilt.” The Rebels opening drive started off well, and Scott went 66 yards on a screen pass for a touchdown, but a holding penalty negated the score. “We’re not a good enough football team to overcome when a touchdown gets called back or a couple of first downs getting called back,” Ole Miss head coach Houston Nutt said. “It’s really hard for us because we’re just
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having a hard enough time staying in rhythm.” On their first possession of the game, Georgia struck first as freshman running back Isaiah Crowell, who rushed for a career-high 147 yards and 30 carries, led his team down the field to set up a 36-yard field goal from senior place kicker Blair Walsh. Georgia made it 10-0 on their next possession when sophomore quarterback Aaron Murray scored on a quarterback sneak from one yard out. Sophomore safety Charles Sawyer turned the momentum in the Rebels’ favor when he made an acrobatic interception on a tipped ball, his third of the season, that set Ole Miss up in good field position. But a three-and-out gave the ball back to Georgia. Halfway through the second quarter, Murray, who completed 17 of 26 passes for 268 yards in the game, threw his first of two
PETRE THOMAS | The Daily Mississippian
Senior running back Brandon Bolden is tackled by junior safety Shawn Williams for a loss. The Ole Miss offense finished with 34 rushing yards on 26 carries.
touchdowns. The two-yard touchdown pass to junior tight end Orson Charles capped an eight-play, 99-yard scoring drive for the Bulldogs. Ole Miss responded with their
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first score of the day, which came out of the “Wild Rebel” formation. The play saw a reverse hand off to junior quarterback Randall See LOSS, PAGE 8
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