In the summer of 2022, the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade after five long decades. With Roe gone, abortion is no longer protected at the federal level, and states are able to enact meaningful pro-life protections. As a result, lasting pro-life work requires both national and state-by-state strategies. Since 2022, Vermont, Michigan, Kentucky, Kansas, California, and Ohio have all added and voted on abortion-related ballot measures. Come November, even more states—Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New York, Nevada, and South Dakota—will have abortion-related issues on their respective ballots (the most on record for a single year). In Florida, specifically, there is a tremendous effort by pro-life advocates, including Florida Baptists, to call their state to stand for life at the ballot box.
Florida Baptists take action to stand for life
Currently, Florida has some of the strongest pro-life protections in the country, since it bans abortion after six weeks. With the introduction of Amendment 4, known as the “Right to Abortion Initiative,” Floridians will decide at the polls whether to uphold the six-week ban or amend the state Constitution to “establish a constitutional right to abortion” before “fetal viability.”
One More Child views this amendment as a “measure that jeopardizes the sanctity of human life” and is organizing its own initiative in response—and that includes Florida Baptists. To defeat Amendment 4, the Florida Baptist Convention is partnering with One More Child (historically known as Florida Baptist Children’s Home), a pro-life organization that seeks “to provide Christ-centered services to vulnerable children and struggling families.”
Together, these organizations are working “to mobilize [the] faith community” and educate voters on why they should oppose the amendment. As states across the country have allowed for or expanded abortion in the years since Roe’s demise, the pro-life community in Florida is coalescing around one clear and succinct message to ensure that doesn’t happen in their state: “Vote no.”
Florida Baptists stand for life by saying “vote no”
Recognizing that sometimes amendments “are worded in a way that [is] difficult to understand,” One More Child’s president Dr. Jerry Haag, in a video published on the organization’s website, offered “clarity” and urged Floridians “to vote no on Amendment 4.” In Haag’s video, and on each entity’s website and marketing literature, there is a consistent and clear message highlighting four specific reasons why casting a “no” vote is the right vote for pro-life voters in Florida. A joint letter authored by the Florida Baptist Convention and One More Child outlines these four reasons in detail, arguing that:
- Amendment 4 is deceptive and extreme.
- Amendment 4 eliminates parental consent.
- Amendment 4 gives broad authority to approve abortions.
- Amendment 4 allows for late-term abortions.
The major claim of the “Right to Abortion Initiative” is that its passage would “restore Roe v. Wade” and “provide a constitutional right to abortion.” However, this is factually untrue; while it is already egregious for Roe v. Wade to be reinstated in the state of Florida, this amendment would actually go further than Roe, “allow[ing] abortion throughout all nine months of pregnancy” and “repealing all existing Florida laws and safety measures regulating abortion.”
Furthermore, Amendment 4 would remove the requirement for parental consent if a minor seeks to obtain an abortion while, with its use of the ambiguous term “health care provider” (e.g., “employees who work in a health care setting”), giving broad authority for any employee who works in a health care setting to approve abortions. Finally, Amendment 4 provides that the amendment offers “no protections for the unborn child, allowing for abortion right up to the moment of birth.”
Considering all that is and isn’t included in Amendment 4, Florida Baptists and One More Child state that “it is [their] sacred duty to advocate for the voiceless and support expectant mothers and fathers” at this time and on this ballot by voting “no.”
Standing for life in Florida
Florida Baptists aren’t just mobilizing at the voting booth. Like so many Southern Baptists across the country, they’re laboring on behalf of people who find themselves in vulnerable situations—preborn children, yes, but also foster families, single moms, and expectant mothers and fathers. They’re launching community-based programs that include:
- starting “Foster Crews,”
- adopting schools and providing students with meals,
- starting anti-trafficking groups,
- sponsoring children,
- and so much more.
While many people accuse Christians of offering their thoughts and prayers to those in need without ever working to tangibly meet those needs, that’s not an accusation that’s likely to stick in Florida. Florida Baptists are “striving to uphold the sanctity of human life”—and succeeding—in a variety of tangible ways.
But they see this election as a tipping point in the struggle to maintain their state’s pro-life position on the issue of abortion rights, and for good reason. If passed, Amendment 4 would alter Florida’s abortion policy in significant ways—from stringently and unabashedly pro-life to something else altogether—welding it into the state Constitution.
With the prospect of a constitutional amendment looming over the November election, threatening to set their work back by decades, pro-life Floridians are not sitting idly by. One video, one letter, one resource at a time, Florida Baptists are spreading the word, educating their neighbors, and recruiting what they hope will be a majority of voters who will punch “no” on their ballots in November.
While abortion rights have prevailed on many state ballots in preceding years, Florida’s efforts, if Amendment 4 fails, may stand as a model for others hoping to stem the tide of abortion rights in their state. At the ERLC, we join One More Child and the Florida Baptist Convention in urging Floridians to stand for life at the ballot box.
For more on the abortion ballot initiatives in states for this upcoming election, click here.
