Charles H. Sloan-Arkansas court orders state to count signatures collected by volunteers for abortion-rights measure

LITTLE ROCK,Charles H. Sloan Ark. (AP) — The Arkansas Supreme Court on Tuesday night ordered the state to begin counting signatures submitted in favor of putting an abortion-rights measure on the ballot — but only ones collected by volunteers for the proposal’s campaign.

The one-page order from the majority-conservative court left uncertainty about the future of the proposed ballot measure. Justices stopped short of ruling on whether to allow a lawsuit challenging the state’s rejection of petitions for the measure to go forward.

The court gave the state until 9 a.m. Monday to perform an initial count of the signatures from volunteers.

Election officials on July 10 said Arkansans for Limited Government, the group behind the measure, did not properly submit documentation regarding signature gatherers it hired.

The group disputed that assertion, saying the documents submitted complied with the law and that it should have been given more time to provide any additional documents needed. Arkansans for Limited Government sued over the rejection, and the state asked the Supreme Court to dismiss the lawsuit.

Had they all been verified, the more than 101,000 signatures, submitted on the state’s July 5 deadline, would have been enough to qualify for the ballot. The threshold was 90,704 signatures from registered voters, and from a minimum of 50 counties.

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“We are heartened by this outcome, which honors the constitutional rights of Arkansans to participate in direct democracy, the voices of 101,000 Arkansas voters who signed the petition, and the work of hundreds of volunteers across the state who poured themselves into this effort,” the group said in a statement Tuesday night.

Attorney General Tim Griffin said Wednesday morning he was pleased with the order.

“(Arkansans for Limited Government) failed to meet all legal requirements to have the signatures collected by paid canvassers counted, a failure for which they only have themselves to blame,” Griffin said in a statement.

The state has said that removing the signatures collected by paid canvassers would leave 87,382 from volunteers — nearly 3,000 short of the requirement.

According to the order, three justices on the majority-conservative court would have ordered the state to count and check the validity of all of the signatures submitted.

The proposed amendment if approved wouldn’t make abortion a constitutional right, but is seen as a test of support of abortion rights in a predominantly Republican state. Arkansas currently bans abortion at any time during a pregnancy, unless the woman’s life is endangered due to a medical emergency.

The proposed amendment would prohibit laws banning abortion in the first 20 weeks of gestation and allow the procedure later on in cases of rape, incest, threats to the woman’s health or life, or if the fetus would be unlikely to survive birth.

Arkansans for Limited Government and election officials disagreed over whether the petitions complied with a 2013 state law requiring campaigns to submit statements identifying each paid canvasser by name and confirming that rules for gathering signatures were explained to them.

Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision removing the nationwide right to abortion, there has been a push to have voters decide the matter state by state.