Abortion in Missouri

As of 2024, the legal status of abortion in Missouri is unclear. From 2022 to 2024, abortions were only legal in cases of medical emergency, with several additional laws designed to make accessing abortion services difficult.[1][2] In 2014, a poll by the Pew Research Center found that 45% of Missouri adults said that abortion should be legal vs. 50% that believe it should be illegal in all or most cases and 5% that do not know.[3] The 2023 American Values Atlas reported that, in their most recent survey, 55% of Missourians said that abortion should be legal in all or most cases.[4] According to a 2014 Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) study, 51% of white women in the state believed that abortion is legal in all or most cases.[5]

Abortion in Missouri was legalized after the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973. Peaking at 29 abortion clinics in 1982, the number began to decline, going from twelve in 1992 to one in 2014, down to zero for a time in 2016, but back to one from 2017 to May 2019 when the last remaining clinic announced it would likely lose its license. However, the clinic remained open as of 2020.

According to the Guttmacher Institute, in 2017, there were 4,710 abortions in Missouri. There was an eight percent decline in the abortion rate in Missouri between 2014 and 2017, from 4.4 to 4.0 abortions per 1,000 women of reproductive age. Abortions in Missouri represent 0.5 percent of all abortions in the United States.[citation needed]

In 2017, about 33 percent of abortions were medication abortions.[citation needed]

The state saw anti-abortion rights violence in 2000 in Marion County.[citation needed][6]

On June 24, 2022, following the United States Supreme Court's ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt signed a legal opinion bringing into effect the state's "trigger law", HB126, banning all non-medically necessary abortions.[7] Schmitt signed the opinion within minutes of the Dobbs decision being announced, and the Missouri Attorney General's Office thereafter declared that "Missouri has become the first in the country to effectively end abortion."[8] However, Amendment 3 was an initiative approved for the Missouri ballot in November 2024, which passed. The initiative legalized abortion in the state to the point of fetal viability by amending the state's constitution.[9][10][11][12]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Abor MO was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Vagianos, Alanna (June 24, 2022). "Abortion Is Now Illegal In These States". Yahoo! News. Retrieved June 24, 2022.
  3. ^ https://www.pewresearch.org/religious-landscape-study/database/state/missouri/views-about-abortion#views-about-abortion
  4. ^ "Abortion Views in All 50 States: Findings from PRRI's 2023 American Values Atlas | PRRI". PRRI | At the intersection of religion, values, and public life. May 2, 2024. Retrieved October 30, 2024.
  5. ^ Brownstein, Ronald (May 23, 2019). "White Women Are Helping States Pass Abortion Restrictions". The Atlantic. Retrieved May 26, 2019.
  6. ^ Jacobsen, Mirielle; Royer, Heather (December 2010). "Aftershocks: The Impact of Clinic Violence on Abortion Services". National Bureau of Economic Research. Working Paper Series. doi:10.3386/w16603. S2CID 11034855.
  7. ^ "Abortion ends in Missouri following SCOTUS ruling". June 24, 2022.
  8. ^ Shorman (July 6, 2022). "Abortion banned in Missouri as trigger law takes effect, following Supreme Court ruling". www.kansascity.com. Retrieved August 22, 2024.
  9. ^ Betts, Anna (July 20, 2023). "Missouri Supreme Court Allows Abortion Ballot Initiative to Move Ahead". The New York Times. Retrieved November 8, 2023.
  10. ^ "Arizona and Missouri to vote on abortion rights in November". BBC News. August 13, 2024. Retrieved August 15, 2024.
  11. ^ "Missouri HB126 | 2019 | Regular Session". LegiScan. Retrieved August 27, 2024.,
  12. ^ "Missouri voters enshrine abortion rights in a state that has a near-total ban". AP News. November 5, 2024. Retrieved November 6, 2024.