Florida’s Supreme Court upheld the state’s right to limit abortion, giving the green light for a six-week ban to take effect on 1 May.

But in a 4-3 vote, the justices also approved a November ballot initiative that, if approved, would overturn the ban and enshrine broad abortion access in the state’s constitution.

The ruling was applauded by national anti-abortion activists, many of whom see a six-week ban as the optimum for abortion policy.

At the same time, lawmakers who supported the Florida law called it a compromise as it includes exceptions for cases involving rape, incest, abnormalities and when the mother’s life is in danger.

It also requires patients seeking abortions to have two in-person doctor appointments with a 24-hour waiting period in between.

One the law is implemented it will block almost all access to abortion in the US South, where Florida had been an outlier, surrounded by states that had already implemented six-week or total bans on the procedure.