SENATOR TIM LESLIE - POSITION STATEMENT


                          RECLAIMING PARENTAL RIGHTS
                              Senator Tim Leslie
                                 May 12, 1997


"Your children are not your children... They come to you, but they are not 
from you, and though they are with you, they belong not to you... You can 
house their bodies but not their souls... Your children belong to the future."  
These words are taken from a song accompanying the credits of a video 
presentation intended for teachers entitled, "It's Elementary:  Talking About 
Gay Issues in School."  These words view children as the property, possession 
and responsibility of the community.  Taking a complete about-face from 
tradition and commonsense wherein parents delegate limited authority to the 
state to educate their children, we are expected to believe that parents have 
been graciously delegated the privilege of housing children who, in reality, 
belong to "the village."

Reference a court decision issued last year by Texas Judge Melinda Harmon.  
Parents had filed suit against a local school district for a violation of 
parental and privacy rights when, without their knowledge or consent, their 
son was interrogated and physically examined by a Child Protective Services 
worker investigating unsubstianted abuse.  The child was forced to strip for 
the female social worker who then instructed the boy to lie to his parents 
about the incident.  Judge Harmon ruled against the parents with the 
admonishment that, "parents give up their rights when they drop off their 
children at a public school."

In March of last year, 58 sixth grade girls in Pennsylvania were herded into a 
nurse's office, forced to strip and undergo a pelvic exam without parental 
knowledge or consent.  Those girls who cried or asked permission to leave or 
call their parents were admonished to stop being "such babies" and were denied 
permission to leave or call home.  Many of the eleven- and twelve-year-old 
girls had never undergone such an exam and were rightly traumatized by the 
event.  A group of outraged parents filed suit against the district.  The 
school district employees, the local medical society and many local teachers 
rallied to the district's defense.  The physician insisted that the exams were 
in the interest of children and commented that, "Even a parent doesn't have 
the right to say what's appropriate for a physician to do when they're doing 
an exam."  Although the case is pending, the school board voted to allow the 
exams again this year.

Here in California, parents who had requested that their child be excused from 
classroom exercises incorporating values clarification, moral dilemmas, 
discussions of the supernatural and other non-academic instruction received a 
district response stating in part, "Public schools are not interested in 
undermining the efforts of parents or in manipulating the beliefs of their 
children...However, the schools are... empowered with significant discretion 
in setting curriculum... [T]he District does not ... require parental consent 
to ordinary classroom activities or teaching techniques..."  Translation:  
"Tough luck, folks.  You relinquished many of your rights at the schoolhouse 
door."

Another angry mom called my office recently and informed my staff that, 
unbeknownst to her, her eleven year old daughter had been exposed to graphic 
depictions of heterosexual and homosexual activity at her school.

Although too late for this parent and so many others, I introduced Senate Bill 
1110 to require that parents receive adequate prior notification, upon student 
registration or by mail of guest speakers or special presentations relating to 
sex or family life scheduled during the school year.  In their letter opposing 
my original bill (which required documented affirmative consent), the 
California Teachers Association stated that sex education must be "...judged 
and controlled by skilled professionals without undue influence."  Well, there 
you go.  Parents have officially been relegated to the role of "undue 
influence."

Unbelievably, my SB 1110 may still have an uphill battle in both Houses of the 
Legislature, however, considering the many instances where parents' rights 
have been ignored or violated, ensuring sufficient notification seems the very 
least we can do.