Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Tennessee Lawmaker Would Punish Babies by Denying Birth Certificates


When it comes to having the most insane and just plain mean-spirited lawmakers, Tennessee is always competitive. Between the anti-gay bills, anti-woman bills, anti-baby bills, anti-immigrant bills and pro-gun bills up for consideration by the current wannabe Tennessee Taliban Legislature, it's hard to single out the most insane and mean-spirited bill, but this unconstitutional one from lunatic Rep. Stacey Campfield is definitely in the running:

No birth certificates for children of undocumented mothers (HB0817 Campfield): Prohibits registration of a birth certificate for a child of an illegal immigrant mother unless the father is a U.S. citizen and he provides a written agreement for financial support of the child until age 18. This bill is blatantly unconstitutional and would not survive a legal challenge. Companion bill is SB1241 (Bunch).

Via ACLU-TN (pdf).