- Pay Equity in the Workplace Act SB0949/HB0065
This bill would revise various present law provisions
regarding wage discrimination. It offers so many changes that some people
think it has no chance of passage; that we may have to do this one step at a
time. It has been "placed behind the budget", so it may never get to be voted
on in present legislative session.
- Emergency Contraception for Rape Victims
Yet another bill pending after no action on it in 2007
is HB1989/SB2073, by Rep. Janis Sontany and Sen. Beverly Marrero. The
bill is pending in the House Public Health Subcommittee and the Senate
Judiciary Committee and would require hospital emergency rooms to offer
emergency contraception (EC) to rape victims. (Hospitals may opt out by
claiming religious affiliation, although rape victims must at least be told
about EC.) We will be asking the sponsors how we can help get the legislation
moving since the NWPC supports this bill.
- SJR 127 Constitutional amendment that would
prohibit the application of a privacy provision in Tennessee’s Constitution
to any rights pertaining to abortion.
The NWPC has long opposed SJR127, which was also
considered during the previous General Assembly. The proponents (Sen. Black
is the lead Senate sponsor) argue that its passage is necessary to eliminate
judicial “interference” in legislative attempts to regulate abortion. Three
provisions were indeed struck down several years ago, including a 48-hour
waiting period, an informed consent requirement that applied only to
physicians, and a requirement that second trimester abortions being performed
only in hospitals. However, a parental consent provision remains and informed
consent is required by other parts of the code.
SJR 127 will clearly pass the Senate, as it has twice before, but may have a
harder time on the House side, at least partly due to the lack of any
continued constitutional protection for some of the most vulnerable women who
may consider abortion, namely rape and incest victims and those whose lives
are in danger. A Senate amendment added last week does not offer any such
protection but, rather, simply states the obvious – it will be up to the
legislature to consider passing such protections in the future.
Unfortunately, some press accounts of the amendment have been completely
incorrect. This bill passed in the TN Senate 1-30-08, and goes next to the TN
House of Representatives.
- Mandatory Joint Custody Bills
Although a 2007 bill requiring mandatory joint custody
passed the Senate, it failed in a House subcommittee. That has not stopped
freshman Rep. G.A. Hardaway from introducing the bill again in 2008, in the
form of HB2423, with SB3387 as the companion bill, sponsored by Sen. Reginald
Tate. The Senate bill has been referred to Senate Judiciary, where it easily
passed last year, and the House bill is likely to go back to the House Child
and Family Affairs Committee. The NWPC opposes this bill, as does the
Tennessee Bar Association.
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