A brand new Arkansas regulation permits an anti-abortion monument on the state Capitol : NPR

Then-Arkansas Gov.-elect Sarah Huckabee Sanders is pictured at a Republican Governors Affiliation convention in November 2022 in Orlando, Fla. Sanders has signed a brand new regulation that may enable an anti-abortion monument to be constructed close to the state Capitol.

Phelan M. Ebenhack/AP

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Phelan M. Ebenhack/AP

Then-Arkansas Gov.-elect Sarah Huckabee Sanders is pictured at a Republican Governors Affiliation convention in November 2022 in Orlando, Fla. Sanders has signed a brand new regulation that may enable an anti-abortion monument to be constructed close to the state Capitol.

Phelan M. Ebenhack/AP

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders has signed a brand new regulation that may enable a monument close to the state Capitol marking the variety of abortions carried out in Arkansas earlier than the U.S. Supreme Courtroom struck down Roe v. Wade.

Sanders’ workplace stated Friday night time that the Republican governor signed the invoice that may enable the creation of a privately funded “monument to the unborn” on the Capitol grounds. The invoice, authorised by lawmakers final week, requires the secretary of state to allow and prepare the position of the monument.

It additionally requires the Capitol Arts and Grounds Fee to supervise the choice of the artist and the design of the monument, with enter from anti-abortion teams.

A regulation Arkansas authorised in 2019 banning practically all abortions took impact final 12 months when the U.S. Supreme Courtroom struck down the 1973 Roe choice. Arkansas’ ban solely permits abortions to save lots of the lifetime of the mom in a medical emergency.

Tennessee lawmakers authorised laws in 2018 permitting the same privately funded monument on its Capitol grounds. The monument has not but been put in.

Arkansas’ proposal confronted opposition from some anti-abortion Republicans who stated it was counterproductive, and Democrats who stated the monument proposal was divisive.

Different monuments on the state Capitol grounds embrace a sculpture of the 9 Black college students who built-in Little Rock Central Excessive Faculty. A Ten Commandments monument was put in on the Capitol grounds in 2018.