Anti-Choice Bills Moving in House and Senate
Last year, then Governor Elect, now Governor Blunt stated that his legislative priorities included pushing anti-choice legislation through the House and Senate. We can now see that the Missouri General Assembly has the same priorities. But, while the Governor and the anti-choice members of the House and Senate are working to further restrict women's reprodcuctive rights in this state, NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri is working to protect those rights.
On February 16,
HB 34 and HB 100, were given public hearings. SB 2 and SB 198 are being heard on February 21.
NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri along with pro-choice activists, students, community leaders, and coalition partners, was at the Capitol on the 16th and will be there again on the 21st to oppose these dangerous pieces of legislation.
HB 100 would impose a civil liability on anyone who assists a minor in obtaining an abortion in Illinois without her parents' consent.
HB 34 would delete the sections of Missouri's sex ed law that require that contraceptive methods are taught.
HB 100--Teen Endangerment
Testimony of Carolyn Sullivan,
Executive Director for NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri,
To House Children and Families Committee
In Opposition To HB 100
February 16, 2005
Hello, my name is Carolyn Sullivan and I am the Executive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri. I am here representing our members and the majority of Missouri citizens, who are pro-choice.
I am here to urge you to oppose House Bill 100 (HB 100), which would allow parents and minors to sue anyone – including grandparents, clergy members or health care providers – who aids or assists a minor to obtain an abortion without first involving her parents or undergoing a judicial proceeding to waive the parental involvement requirement. Trusted, caring and responsible adults would be faced with the threat of lawsuits if they responded to a plea for help from a young woman who in good faith believes she cannot involve her parent. At a time which we would all concede is one often filled with emotional anguish for a young adult, this bill would serve only to further isolate these minors, leaving them without any adult assistance or guidance at all. Who among us would want any of our loved ones facing any kind of crisis situation alone, never mind a minor daughter, sister or niece facing a medical procedure alone?
NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri supports the idea that young women involve their parents in important decisions surrounding a crisis pregnancy, and, in fact, most young women already do. However, this bill does not do anything to improve family communication. Instead, the bill, which would be the first of its kind in the country, is wholly unprecedented, dangerous to minors’ health and surely unconstitutional. It is indeed path breaking, but pointed down the wrong path. Passing this bill will incite a lawsuit that is certain to deplete the state of much-needed funds. Further, it would turn neighbors upon neighbors, allowing virtually anyone to serve as a private attorney general to enforce Missouri’s parental involvement law.
Rather than making abortion more difficult and dangerous for young women, the Missouri legislature should do more to create the conditions that enable young women to make true reproductive choices by providing comprehensive sex education and ensuring that women have access to a range of effective contraceptives. Pro-choice Missourians believe passionately that women have the right to decide for themselves when to bring children into the world - without government interference. Many of you disagree - passionately and sincerely.
We will never resolve our differences on this basic question. But we should agree on an equally fundamental point: Missouri would be a better state if we helped more women prevent unintended pregnancy.
Missouri would be a better state for all of us if fewer young women were faced with the consequences of an unintended pregnancy; however, this bill does nothing to achieve that common goal. Putting up a literal or figurative road block at the state’s border only does harm to the health and well-being of Missouri’s young women and their families; it does nothing to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies.
For that reason, this bill is a giant step in the wrong direction; it is a step that will lead us down the road of increasing, not decreasing, unintended pregnancies and, thus, abortions. For that reason, we urge you to vote no on HB 100.
For these, and the following, reasons NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri opposes HB 100 and urges you to do the same.
I. HB 100 Threatens Young Women’s Lives and Health
• Most young women find love, support, and safety in their homes. In fact, in most instances, young women already involve one or both parents when considering abortion – without being required to do so. One study found that 61 percent of parents in states without mandatory parental consent or notice laws knew of their daughter’s pregnancy. The government, however, cannot mandate healthy family communication where it does not already exist.
• Many young women, however, justifiably fear that they would be physically or emotionally abused if forced to disclose their pregnancy to their parents. Young women who do not involve a parent often come from families in which government-mandated disclosure could have devastating effects.
• When a young woman cannot involve a parent in her decision to have an abortion – whether because the pregnancy is the result of incest or the young woman fears her parents’ reaction – the law, public policy and medical professionals should encourage her to involve a trusted adult, not punish the adult for providing physical and emotional support. Again, most adolescents know this intuitively. One study found that more than half of all young women who did not involve a parent in their decisions regarding a pregnancy did involve an adult, including 15 percent who involved a step-parent or other adult relative.
• By penalizing adults who help young women during crisis pregnancies, the law would expose young women to increased health risks. In one study, 93 percent of minors who did not involve a parent in their decision to obtain an abortion were still accompanied by someone to the abortion clinic. Although legal abortion is very safe, it is typically advisable to accompany any patient undergoing even minor surgery. But HB 100 would force some minors to drive themselves to out-of-state clinics, without the help of trusted adults or friends, thereby exposing them to greater health risks.
• Young women may have no alternative but traveling to another state to obtain, or even discuss the option of, an abortion. Access to abortion providers in Missouri is severely limited. Ninety seven (97) percent of Missouri counties do not have an abortion provider. Thus, for some women, a reproductive health facility in another state, such as the Hope Clinic for Women in Granite City, Illinois, may be the closest to their home. Because HB 100 does not require intent to evade state law, only intent to enable a minor to obtain an out-of-state abortion, a grandmother could be subject to civil liability for accompanying her granddaughter to an out-of-state facility – even if the facility was the closest to the young woman’s home and they were not attempting to evade a parental involvement law.
II. The Missouri Legislature Should Focus on Putting Prevention First In Order To Reduce the Number of Unintended Pregnancies Among Teenagers
Abortion among teenagers should be made less necessary, not more difficult and dangerous. A comprehensive approach to promoting adolescent reproductive health and reducing teen pregnancy will require an array of components, including:
• age-appropriate health and sex education with medically accurate information;
• life options programs that offer teens practical life skills and the motivation to delay sexual activity;
• programs for pregnant and parenting teens that teach parenting skills and help ensure that teens finish school; and
• increased information about and access to emergency contraception pills; and access to confidential health services, including family planning and abortion.
III. HB 100 is Unconstitutional
The sponsor of HB 100 presents it as an initiative that protects Missouri’s right to enforce its parental involvement law. The legislation, however, infringes on fundamental principles of federalism in at least two ways:
• Right to Travel. Under the Constitution, each citizen has the right to move freely from one state to another and to enjoy the “privileges and immunities” of a state s/he visits. For example, this principle allows citizens from states that outlaw gambling to gamble in states where it is permitted. By saddling a young woman with Missouri law wherever she may travel, HB 100 denies her the right to enjoy the laws of another state and thus violates her constitutionally protected right to travel. Such legislation flies in the face of established Supreme Court precedent, such as Doe v. Bolton, which struck down Georgia’s law forbidding out of state residents from obtaining abortions in Georgia. The Supreme Court also held in Saenz v. Roe that the protection afforded to individuals by the citizenship clause of the Fourteenth Amendment limits the federal government. “It provides important protections for nonresidents who enter a State whether to obtain employment . . . [or] to procure medical services . . . .” The Supreme Court has further held that a compelling state interest must be shown in support of any classifications that serve to penalize the constitutional right to move between states. No such interest has been demonstrated by the supporters of HB 100.
• Comity Among the States. In addition, HB 100 violates the sovereignty of states that have chosen not to restrict minors’ access to abortion. Currently, six states and the District of Columbia have no parental involvement laws on the books, and an additional ten states have such laws, but do not enforce them. And states with such laws have varying formulations, e.g., notice/consent; one parent/two parent; parents/others such as grandparents. If enacted, this legislation would require all persons to comply with the restrictive law of a minor’s resident state, violating constitutional principles of comity among the states and creating undue burdens upon providers who would be obliged to have and enforce detailed, state-by-state information regarding parental involvement laws.
• Because of these constitutional issues, HB 100 will certainly be challenged in court. This challenge will cost the taxpayers of Missouri scarce state budget funds.
IV. HB 100 Authorizes Expansive Intrusion into Private, Family Matters
• Under the bill, any person “adversely affected or who reasonably may be adversely affected” can petition the Attorney General to enjoin conduct that would be in violation of the law. This could turn Missouri into something of a police state, with neighbors reporting on neighbors, intrusively trying to obtain governmental intrusion into personal, private decision-making.
• The potential class of plaintiffs is expansive and vague. It is quite radical to allow plaintiffs to include anyone who is “adversely affected” by the minor obtaining an abortion without parental consent. Because of this unclear language, the scope of potential plaintiffs claiming to be adversely affected is beyond comprehension.
• The potential class of people subject to liability under the bill is also expansive and vague. Under the bill, anyone who enables a minor to obtain an abortion is subject to liability. But the bill does not define what it means to “cause, aid or assist a minor to obtain an abortion.” As written, the bill could currently sweep in everyone from the grandmother who takes the minor, to the aunt living in Illinois who unwittingly allows the minor to stay in her home overnight, to the health care provider who performs the procedure – even if none of them are intentionally trying to evade the minor’s home state parental involvement law.
V. HB 100 Unnecessarily Seeks to Revise Existing Law Regarding Judicial Bypass Procedure.
• It is unnecessary to add further restrictions to this already complicated, burdensome and intimidating law. Missouri’s parental involvement law includes a judicial bypass provision through which a young woman can obtain an abortion without parental involvement. For young women, it can be overwhelming and, at times, impossible to manage the judicial bypass procedures. Judicial bypass procedures are not a realistic alternative for some young women—who are forced to go out-of-state to obtain confidential health care. Some young women simply are intimidated by the required legal procedures, or cannot attend hearings scheduled during school hours, especially while attempting to maintain confidentiality. Others do not seek, or delay seeking, judicial review because they fear that the proceedings are not confidential or that they will be recognized by people at the courthouse. Many young women simply do not want to reveal intimate details of their personal lives to strangers. The time required to schedule the court proceeding may result in a delay of a week or more, thereby increasing the health risks of the abortion.
• The bill seeks to include in the definition of “next friend” any person who has a financial interest of “potential gain from the proposed abortion, or any employee of or volunteer for such entity of person” and yet it fails to define either “financial interest” or “potential gain.” These phrases are so broad that any person who seeks to help a young woman obtain a judicial bypass could potentially fall within the prohibition.
• The legislature should focus on measures designed to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies. Instead of further complicating a judicial procedure already fraught with confusion and intimidation, the legislature should focus on measures intended to decrease unintended pregnancy and the need for abortion, such as comprehensive and medically accurate sex education and increased access to contraception. Rather than further restrict minors' constitutional right to privacy, we urge you to focus on measures that would prevent young women from ever having to make such a choice.
HB 34--Abstinence Only Education is Bad for Missouri
Testimony of Angie Postal
Community Organizer for NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri,
To Elementary and Secondary Education Committee
In Opposition To HB 34
February 16, 2005
Hello, my name is Angie Postal and I am the Community Organizer for NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri, the state affiliate of NARAL Pro-Choice America. I am representing our members and the majority of Missouri citizens, who support age-appropriate, comprehensive sex-education.
Pro-choice Missourians believe passionately that women have the right to decide for themselves when to bring children into the world - without government interference. Many of you disagree - passionately and sincerely.
We will never resolve our differences on this basic question. But we should agree on an equally fundamental point: Missouri would be a better state if we helped more women prevent unintended pregnancy.
Certainly one way to help reduce unintended pregnancies is through better access to information about birth control. HB 34 is about denying Missouri's young women and men that medically factual information. For that reason, it is a giant step in the wrong direction; it is a step that will lead us down the road of increasing, not decreasing, unintended pregnancies and, thus, abortions. For that reason, we urge you to vote no on HB 34.
Missouri’s Current Sex Education Law Favors Abstinence While Providing Students With Comprehensive Information
Missouri currently has a responsible sex-education law that requires public schools to
present students with the latest medically factual information regarding both the possible side effects and health benefits of all forms of contraception, including the success and failure rates for the prevention of pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases .
Missouri’s current law also already requires that course materials
[p]resent abstinence from sexual activity as the preferred choice of behavior in relation to all sexual activity for unmarried pupils because it is the only method that is one hundred percent effective in preventing pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases and the emotional trauma associated with adolescent sexual activity .
Abstinence is an important component to any sex-education program, but, alone, it is not enough to provide the students of Missouri with the information to protect themselves from unintended pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases.
Abstinence-only programs have never been proven effective and may result in riskier behavior by teenagers. Responsible sex education programs, on the other hand, have demonstrated positive results such as delayed initiation of sex, reduced frequency of sex, and increased contraceptive use.
Abstinence-Only Education is Not Scientifically Proven___________________________
Ideologically driven groups, not scientific or public health organizations, have pushed the proliferation of abstinence-only programs. In fact, current scientific research fails to show that abstinence-only programs are effective.
• In 2001, the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy found no credible studies of abstinence-only programs showing any significant impact on participants’ initiation of or frequency of sex.
Abstinence-Only Programs Harm Adolescents____________________________________
By denying adolescents complete information and by censoring teachers, abstinence-only programs endanger our youth.
• Abstinence-only programs can harm teens by putting them at risk of pregnancy and STDs. Abstinence-only programs fail to provide information about contraception beyond failure rates, and, in some cases, provide misinformation. Without complete and accurate information, some teens therefore may forgo contraceptive use, jeopardizing their reproductive health.
• The lack of responsible sex education puts teens at risk of pregnancy and STDs, including HIV. One study that compared an abstinence-only program with a more comprehensive “safer-sex” program found that “only the safer-sex intervention significantly reduced unprotected sexual intercourse.”
Responsible, Age-Appropriate Sex Education Works______________________________
Current research indicates that more comprehensive sex education programs that discuss both abstinence and contraception have positive effects.
• In 2001, the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy concluded that sex and HIV education programs that discuss both abstinence and contraception delay the onset of sex, reduce the frequency of sex, and increase contraceptive use.
Moreover, their review of studies dispelled many of the myths attached to responsible sex education programs. In particular, the study showed that sexuality and HIV education programs that include discussion of condoms and contraception:
do not hasten the onset of sexual intercourse;
do not increase the frequency of sexual intercourse; and
do not increase the number of sexual partners.
• The National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine concluded that sex education and condom availability programs in schools do not increase sexual activity among teenagers.
Americans Overwhelmingly Oppose Abstinence-Only Programs
• The vast majority of Americans has consistently supported sex education in schools:
A 2002 study revealed that 90 percent of the “engaged” public supports age-appropriate and medically accurate sex education for all students beginning in the early grades and continuing through high school.
A 1999 public opinion survey found that 93 percent of Americans support teaching sex education to high school students, while 84 percent support sex education for junior high school students.
• Eighty-nine (89) percent of Americans believe it is important for young people to have information about contraception and STD prevention and that sex education programs should focus on how to avoid unintended pregnancies and STDs.
• Parents want secondary school sex education to provide more information than is currently conveyed. In fact, over eight in ten parents believe that how to use condoms (85 percent) and other birth control methods (84 percent), as well as how to discuss them with partners (88 percent), should be taught. Parents also want schools to cover “real-life issues,” such as how to handle pressure to have sex (94 percent) and the emotional consequences of being sexually active (94 percent).
• When given the opportunity to remove their children from sex education classes, no more than one to five percent of parents actually do so.
Medical Experts Support Responsible Sex Education, Not Abstinence-Only
The following individuals and organizations support responsible sex education:
• American Academy of Pediatrics
• American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
• American Medical Association
• American Public Health Association
• AIDS Action
• National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine
• National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy
• National Institutes of Health
• Former U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher
Conclusion: Abstinence is Necessary but Not Sufficient___________________________
Teaching children about abstinence is a critical part of a well-rounded and effective sex education program. But abstinence by itself is not sufficient. Young people deserve complete and accurate information about their reproductive health, including abstinence, pregnancy prevention, and STD/HIV prevention. Only when teens have reliable information about their reproductive health can they make informed and appropriate decisions.
Given the fact that abstinence-only programs have not been proven effective, and that responsible sex education has been shown to delay initiation of sex, reduce the frequency of sex, and increase contraceptive use—which in turn prevents unintended pregnancies and abortions—Missouri should maintain its responsible sex education law.
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