At the end of mass, at the Sainte-Marguerite-Marie church in Louisville, two women distribute blue T-shirts and small signs to the faithful to plant in their garden, as Americans do in the run-up to the elections. to support a candidate. Two of them have already been in place for several days near the entrances to this vast modern brick and concrete church.
Signs calling to vote in front of churches
These panels do not bear a candidate’s name. But it is all about politics: “Vote for life. Yes to Amendment 2”, can we read. On November 8, the day of the midterm elections to renew Congress in Washington, after two years of the Biden presidency, voters in Kentucky will also have to vote on an amendment stipulating that nothing in their State Constitution “cannot be interpreted as guaranteeing the right to abortion”.
“It is extremely important to finally put an end to abortion,” explains Amy, one of the two volunteers present at the end of the mass in Sainte-Marguerite-Marie. “We’ll have to wear it, huh?” When you play football, for example,” she said to a shy teenager holding out his hand to receive a T-shirt bearing the campaign slogan.
A law adopted by Kentucky before the abandonment of the “Roe vs. Wade” judgment in June by the Supreme Court came into force as soon as the judges reversed themselves. It prohibits abortion in all cases, except when the health of the mother is at stake. First blocked by local justice, this new law is now in force. But the State Supreme Court is due to consider in November an interpretation of the Kentucky Constitution that would argue in favor of the right to abortion. Hence the decision of the state assemblies, in the hands of the Republicans, to sweep away this uncertainty with this referendum.
Five referendums on abortion on November 8
Four other states will have to decide on abortion on November 8. In California, Michigan and Vermont, voters will be asked to amend the Constitution of their states to include the right to abortion, while in Montana it will be a question of validating an anti-abortion law. IVG.
But it is Kentucky that is generating national interest, three months after the surprise failure of a similar referendum this summer in Kansas, another very Republican state. Donald Trump won in Kentucky in 2016 as in 2020, with nearly two-thirds of the vote. “What happens here will impact the continuation of the abortion debate, in our state but also at the national level,” explains Jason Hall, director of the Catholic Conference of Kentucky, a lobbying organization created in 1984 by the bishops of Kentucky to defend the views of the Church with local elected officials.
Calls to vote during Mass
The Catholic Church is one of the major players in the campaign for the constitutional amendment, in its own name but also within a coalition with the Baptist Church and several evangelical organizations. “We sent letters to the parish priests of the diocese, recommending that they read them at Mass, elements for parish bulletins, published articles in the press, placed advertisements on Catholic radio stations… In short, everything that we can “, explains Stephen Bowling, Deacon of the Archdiocese of Louisville. Concluding the mass at Sainte-Marguerite-Marie, the parish priest read a message calling on the faithful to “vote for life”on November 8, approving the amendment.
“It is extremely unusual to see the Church get so involved in a vote,” explains David Buckley, professor of political science at the University of Louisville. Himself a Catholic, he does not remember having heard calls for a specific vote during mass before this campaign. “The Church regularly makes itself heard on social issues, particularly on issues of racial justice or the fight against poverty, but not on a vote, even less during mass”, he specifies.
In the United States, the Churches do not have, in theory, the right to make policy, in favor of a candidate or a party, under penalty of losing an advantageous tax statute. But here, says Jason Hall, “It’s not about politics, it’s about values”. And even though Catholics make up only about 10 percent of the state’s population, Louisville, Kentucky’s largest city, has had a strong Catholic presence since the early 1900s.e century. Nearly 60,000 households receive each week The Recordthe weekly newspaper of the diocese, which gives pride of place to the campaign for the amendment.
Kentucky is a state in the « Bible Belt », the “belt of the Bible”, where the Protestant faith, Baptist in particular, is omnipresent. In Louisville bookstores, the sections devoted to faith are larger than those devoted to social issues. But the pro-choice camp is not powerless. He even raised a lot of funds, far more than the supporters of Amendment 2. “The ratio is 6 to 1, laments Jason Hall. A lot of money comes from out of state. » People who participated in the victorious campaign in Kansas are at work in Louisville, where they hope again to create a surprise. On November 8, the elections to Congress will be rich in lessons for the future of the United States. But so does the referendum in Kentucky.
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More and more states ban abortion
Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Idaho, Texas, and Tennessee, these states have already enacted a total ban on abortion. Indiana prohibits it except to preserve the life of the mother, in cases of rape, incest or “fatal” fetal anomaly.
The mid-term elections, on November 8, could pave the way for protections, restrictions or outright bans.
Abortion is legal in about twenty states. California, Oregon, New Jersey, have further strengthened the right to voluntary termination of pregnancy (IVG).