The Dobbs decision stripped us of our federally protected reproductive rights in June 2022, leaving reproductive autonomy rights up to the states—which generally means it’s up to the scope of protections found within state constitutions.
Since Dobbs, every single effort to explicitly affirm or enshrine reproductive autonomy rights in state constitutions has won at the ballot box, reflecting what we have long known: The vast majority of Americans support reproductive freedom.
Of course, that’s also true in Pennsylvania: Most Pennsylvanians oppose government mandates installed by extremist anti-abortion politicians who are hell-bent on telling us what to do and how to live while trying to interfere with the most private and sacred aspects of our family lives.
As the number of known abortion-ban injuries continues to mount and countless more pregnant people suffer every day, we hear the call of Pennsylvanians who want to enshrine reproductive autonomy rights in our state Constitution.
But we also see a lot of misinformation about how constitutional amendments work and efforts that are already underway.
Here are five facts to know about the status of reproductive autonomy rights in Pennsylvania and our state constitution.
- Legal experts believe reproductive autonomy rights are already protected by the Pennsylvania state constitution, in part due to the state Equal Rights Amendment, which was passed without issue in 1971. The Pennsylvania Equal Rights Amendment says, “Prohibition against denial or abridgment of equality of rights because of sex. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania because of the sex of the individual.”
- Pennsylvania law does not allow for citizen-initiated ballot measures. In other words, citizens cannot begin the process of a ballot initiative (that is, constitutional amendment). They don’t come from the Governor, either. Only state lawmakers can initiate a constitutional amendment, which means our power lies in voting people who reflect our values into office, urging our state lawmakers to introduce a constitutional amendment, demanding they vote to advance it, and then getting the vote out when the question finally appears on the ballot.
- A proactive reproductive rights constitutional amendment is in progress in Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania lawmakers introduced House Bill 1888, a constitutional amendment to explicitly enshrine reproductive autonomy rights into our state constitution, in December 2023. Per a new rule in the state Legislature, all constitutional amendments must have a hearing. The hearing on HB1888 was held on December 13.
- The new rule that all constitutional amendments must get a hearing was introduced in response to the notorious anti-abortion midnight raid on our rights in July 2022, when anti-abortion lawmakers met in the middle of the night to advance an anti-abortion constitutional amendment that would strip us of our reproductive autonomy rights and pave the way for forced births, and the suffering that comes with such mandates, in Pennsylvania. While that constitutional amendment is still technically at play, it is not expected to advance.
- Meanwhile, we are awaiting a ruling in a lawsuit wherein we asked the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to explicitly affirm that reproductive autonomy rights are protected by our state Constitution. We are expecting a ruling any day now.
The bottom line: As of January 2024, Pennsylvania abortion law has not changed since the Dobbs decision. Pennsylvania may not be an abortion-ban state, but we are not an “oasis” state, either.
Pennsylvania is an opportunity state. At Women’s Law Project, we are working every single day to explore and implement legal strategies to protect our reproductive autonomy rights, expand abortion and contraceptive access, and protect our health, safety, and privacy from anti-abortion lawmakers.
When we say the future of reproductive rights and abortion and contraception access in Pennsylvania is up to us, we mean both me and you. We need your support to do this work, and we all need everyone to show up at the polls and urge lawmakers to vote our values. Together, we protect each other.
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