The court’s 5-2 ruling came a day before Michigan’s vote should be finalized on Friday.
The bill will be put on the ballot as Proposition 3, which establishes “individual rights to reproductive freedom, including the right to make and enforce all decisions regarding pregnancy.”
Proponents of the amendment say they would stop Michigan’s 1931 abortion law, which prohibits all abortions except those that save the mother’s life.
“We are more energetic and motivated than ever to restore lost protection under Roe.
“This confirms that more than 730,000 voters have read, signed and understood the petition, and the allegations from the opposition are the end of the abortions we have had for nearly 50 years under Law. It is simply designed to distract us from our efforts to preserve our rights.”
The Office of Elections, in its staff report to the board, estimated that the petition had 596,379 valid signatures.
Opponents, however, have disputed the proposed amendment over the lack of spaces between words in the petition.
In Thursday’s order, the state Supreme Court pointed to a 2012 ruling that the commission’s duties on petitions are limited to determining form and content and whether there are sufficient signatures.
Michigan law requires the petition to include the full text of the amendments after the summary and be printed in 8 point type.
The court said, “All the words, with or without spacing, or degree of spacing, remain, remain in the same order, and have no objection to their being printed in 8-point type.”
“In this case, the meaning of the words is not altered by the allegation of insufficient space between words,” the court wrote. “Assuming that the complainant’s objection to the space represents an objection to the ‘form’ of the petition which the Commission has duly considered, the petition meets all statutory formal requirements and therefore the Commission has a clear legal obligation to certify the petition. “
In a concurring opinion, Chief Justice Bridget McCormack criticized two Republicans on the board who voted against the approval, saying it would “disenfranchise millions of Michigan citizens.”
“What a sad marker of the times,” she wrote.
Judge David Viviano dissented, writing that he would not have found that the petition complied with Michigan law and that the commission acted “appropriately” in denying certification.
“Not including spaces presents the amendment in a way that is hard to read and understand. So while the majority here suggests it might contain the correct words in the correct order, The lack of significant word spacing renders the remaining text significantly difficult to read and understand, and therefore less than the ‘full text’ that the constitution and law require,” he argued.
Justice Brian Zahra also disagreed, saying he wanted the court to hear oral argument on the matter. He asked Congress to require the council to certify votes.
Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, said Thursday that the ruling emphasized that “the role of the State Election Critics Commission under the law is to confirm the will of the voters.” said.
The board will meet in person at 10 a.m. Friday, according to a news release from the Michigan State Secretary’s Office.
This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Omar Jimenez and Ethan Cohen contributed to this report.
Source: www.cnn.com
