Jenny West Extra Credit

Jenny West
15 inches of news
Extra Credit
Missouri Governor Signs Sex Ed Bill

Gov. Blunt signed a bill into law earlier this month that adds new limitations to abortion clinics and bans groups that offer abortion services, such as Planned Parenthood, from participating in sex-education programs in public schools. The bill also makes Missouri's Alternatives to Abortion Program permanent, a program which provides state-funded grants to pregnancy centers that encourage women to give birth rather than encouraging them to have abortions.
In a signing ceremony in Jefferson City, Mo., Gov. Matt Blunt said that House Bill 1055 was "one of the strongest pieces of pro-life legislation in Missouri history."

"[The bill] gets abortion providers out of our public school classrooms as sex educators, adds safeguards for women's health by regulating all abortion clinics in the state, and codifies in statute the Alternatives to Abortion Services Programs that have been funded through the appropriations process for the last several years," says Rep. Therese Sander, R-Moberly, who sponsored the bill.

Effective on the 28th of next month, the bill bans school districts from "providing abortion services or allowing a person or entity who provides abortion services from offering, sponsoring or furnishing course materials related to human sexuality and sexually transmitted diseases." It also gives Missouri school districts the option of providing abstinence-only sex education.
Representatives from Planned Parenthood said their lawyers will need more time to examine the law before determining whether to dispute it‘s constitutionality in court. Planned Parenthood spokespeople argue that “Abstinence-only programs are one of the religious right's greatest challenges to the nation's sexual health. But it is only one tactic in a broader, more long-term strategy. Since the early 1980s, the "family values" movement has won the collaboration of governments and public institutions, from Congress to local school boards, in abridging students' constitutional rights.”

They also say that “schools now block student access to sexual health information in class, at the school library, and through the public library's Internet portals. They violate students' free speech rights by censoring student publications of articles referring to sexuality. Abstinence-only programs often promote alarmist misinformation about sexual health and force-feed students religious ideology that condemns homosexuality, masturbation, abortion, and contraception. In doing so, they endanger students' sexual health.”

Although the law has gained much publicity, pro-life groups said the best impact is making the Alternatives to Abortion Program permanent.

The program has been available since 1994 but is now a part of Missouri state law and offers both medical and mental-health services, housing, job training, clothing, food and other services to women during pregnancy and the year after the child's birth.

The now permanent program was allotted $570,000 when Blunt was elected to office in 2004, and is now allotted $1.7 million in the current budget.

Gov. Blunt gave a speech in 2005 to the Missouri Baptist Convention saying that he wanted to counter the "pro-death" message engendered by "Planned Parenthood, the ACLU, and activist judges" and to also pass legislation allowing pharmacists to refuse to administer “the morning after pill.”