The 2008 Legislative Session has been busy thus far, with the Mississippi Senate introducing five bills that will ban, restrict or impede reproductive justice in Mississippi.

• SB 2007 (Nunnelee; Medical procedures on minor by Department of Health; require parental consent)
• SB 2013 (Nunnelee;  Abortions; physicians performing in clinics must have medical malpractice insurance from a company licensed in Mississippi)
• SB 2074 (Fillingane; Abortions; physicians performing in clinics must be board certified in OB/GYN)
• SB 2200 (Yancey; Abortions; prohibit in State of Mississippi)
• SB 2201 (Jackson, 15th; Abortion; shall only be performed or induced by a physician with staff privileges at a licensed hospital in Mississippi)
  

35 years after  Roe v. Wade, extremists are whittling away at our sovereignty over our own bodies and futures.  It's not just about the right to terminate a pregnancy: Reproductive Justice is about contraception being imperfect, and about our access to contraception being even more tragically imperfect (and threatened). It's about there being countless organizations out there urging women with no means to have their children, but offering no support web after they're born. It's about falsifying science (and then legislating false science) to manipulate already emotionally vulnerable women. Roe v. Wade was the birth of an idea that women were competent and capable of moral agency, that they could be trusted to make crucial decisions regarding the rest of their lives.

It's a new year, and an election year, to boot.  Celebrate Roe's birthday with some late resolutions: Resolve to keep aware of what your elected officials are trying to pass into law.  Resolve to write and call them until they know you by name.  Resolve to support (in whatever way you can) the local organizations fighting for reproductive justice.  Best of all, Resolve to Vote.