Anti-abortion group gets court’s OK

DENVER - The Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected an effort by pro-choice groups to stop a Peyton organization from collecting signatures for a 2008 anti-abortion ballot measure.

Colorado for Equal Rights hopes to define life as beginning at fertilization, thereby banning and criminalizing abortion. After a title-setting board OK’d the initiative for signature-gathering, several organizations sued, saying its title is deceptive and misleads voters about the sweeping consequences of the measure.

Supreme Court justices ruled unanimously that the title involves only a single subject and that its intentions are not misleading. Colorado for Equal Rights now can begin collecting the roughly 76,000 signatures it needs to get the initiative on the ballot.

The plaintiff organizations blasted the decision Tuesday, saying that the measure would go beyond banning abortion and would give fertilized eggs access to Colorado courts.