Subject: ACTION ALERT: Indiana
From: James Yorton <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 5 Mar 1996 09:19:55 -0600 (CST)

[ submitted by [email-masked] ]

URGENT INDIANA LEGISLATIVE ALERT
--a joint request for action from
  Catherine Bailey, Lobbyist, Justice, Inc.
  Marla Stevens, Dir. of Public Policy, LGBT Fairness Indiana

ACTION NEEDED:
     Please telephone Governor Bayh at (317) 232-4567.  Ask him to VETO
HB 1346, Parental Rights and Responsibilities.  

ABOUT THE BILL:
     The final form of the bill is under negotiation at this time but some
form of the legislation is likely to pass before the end of session this
week.  At its worst, with the parental rights language added back in
Conference Committee, the bill would give all rights over children under age
18 to their parents except in cases of child abuse or when necessary to
prevent imminent death.  It would supercede all other existing statutes which
guarantee childrens' rights.
     This worst form of the bill would, among other things, make condoms more
difficult for all to get--including adults, nullify emancipation of minors
statutes (and perhaps even existing court orders of emancipation and the
contracts that emancipated minors have already entered into), nullify the
judicial override of parental consent for abortion, allow teen girls to be
forced to have abortions by their parents, deny mature minors' rights to
treatment for sexually transmitted diseases, and override representative
government in the form of elected school boards.
     At its best, the parental rights language will remain shunted to Summer
Study Committee.  On a party line vote in Senate Committee and again in an
amendment vote on the Senate Floor, the bill's Republican authors have
prohibited the Summer Study Committee from concurrently holding a discussion
of the rights of children that are in current law which would be nullified by
their proposed legislation.  This move, besides being morally reprehensible,
 prevents open, truthful testimony on the measure's real effects, both
intended and unintended, and flies against the spirit of free and open
government.

RELIGIOUS RIGHT'S USE OF HOMOPHOBIC FEAR-MONGERING
     In a rally at the Statehouse, Monday, March 4th, Bill Smith, head of the
Indiana Family Association, told the cheering crowd of nearly a thousand
supporters of the bill, that they were fighting a religious and cultural war
for the survival of Hoosier families.  He claimed, "This is not about
Republican versus Democrat or conservative versus liberal, this is about the
Mamas and the Papas versus The Village People."
     Other supporters claimed that the bill's sections limiting the power of
Child Protective Services (CPS) to remove children from abusive parents were
necessary to protect parents from "family-hating" CPS workers who they
believed to be "mostly lesbians".
     In House Committee, the bill's author, Rep. Jon Padfield (R-Kokomo) and
Eric Miller, head of Indiana's largest Christian Coalition affiliate,
Citizens Concerned for the Constitution (CCC), asserted that the bill was
necessary to prevent "anti-family special interests" from forcing the
distribution of condoms in Hoosier schools.  Unfortunately, condoms are not
currently distributed in Hoosier public schools and, given the fact that such
programs would have to first pass local community controlled school HIV
planning committees then receive local school board approval, school-based
condom distribution is highly unlikely in Indiana in the foreseeable future.
 Despite this, CCC members have been telling legislators that condoms are
actually being distributed now and the legislation is needed to stop the
practice.

---
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