“What happens in Mississippi does not stay in Mississippi, and the Magnolia State is not the outlier that many who only ever offer sneers and derision for our state and our people would like to think,” Ashton Pittman writes.
The U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade this morning, paving the way for states like Mississippi to restrict abortion access to a greater extent than any time in the last half century. The ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization immediately allows Mississippi’s ban on nearly all abortions after 15 weeks to go into effect.
A majority of the U.S. Supreme Court has voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, the precedent that has underpinned abortion rights in the United States for 49 years, according to a leaked draft of a ruling Politico reported this evening.
Hundreds of young Mississippians and Alabamans knelt in a dark room, their foreheads to the floor and tears streaming down their faces as each mouthed inaudible prayers, a foreboding melody drowning out their voices. On the stage in front of them, violet lights illuminated the hair of musicians and ministers on the stage, save for a balding man with a thick mustache who squeezed his eyes and rocked back-and-forth as he spoke.
Mississippi’s attorney general claims that “God selected this case” to overturn Roe v. Wade, referring Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. For years, Christian dominionists and their allies have sought to remake the U.S. Supreme Court in order to achieve their goals and establish God’s kingdom on earth. Ending legalized abortion is just one of those goals.
For decades, the Christian Dominionist movement has sought to remake earthly government in its image. This is Part I in an in-depth series exploring how Christian dominionists and their allies worked to get Roe v. Wade and abortion rights back before the U.S. Supreme Court—and how they used Mississippi to make it happen.
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