The Parental Rights Amendment - Will This Really Protect Our Rights As Parents? Or Does It Hand Over Our Rights To The Federal Government?
Last Friday I received an email from HSLDA (Homeschool Legal Defense Association) that was informing it’s members that The Parental Rights Amendment was introduced to both Houses of Congress. I headed over to ParentalRights.org to read more about it.
On the site it shared that this is a significant step forward and they couldn’t have done it without our support. They need our continued help and support because in order for this to pass the House it needs a two-thirds super-majority vote. They are asking everyone to call Congress members D.C. and district offices and encourage them to cosponsor this Amendment. They need people to write or visit their congressmen.
I’ve been following the stories and efforts of ParentalRights.org for some time now. My first thought was
this sound like a great effort, this can be really good for us...right?
I have a habit of researching EVERYTHING whether good or bad because I like to get the details, full scope, bottom line, the facts or basically the real deal. So I began as I normally do looking through my resources and searching articles pertaining to this matter. I came across some opposing views about this amendment. It caused a lot of concern and questions to race through my mind.
Before I get into the opposing views, let’s take a look at what The Parental Rights Amendment consists of:
The proposed Parental Rights Amendment will specifically add parental rights in the text of the U.S. Constitution, protecting these rights for both current and future generations.
Section 1 - The liberty of parents to direct the upbringing, education, and care of their children is a fundamental right.
Section 2 - The parental right to direct education includes the right to choose, as an alternative to public education, private, religious, or home schools, and the right to make reasonable choices within public schools for one's child.
Section 3 - Neither the United States nor any State shall infringe these rights without demonstrating that its governmental interest as applied to the person is of the highest order and not otherwise served.
Section 4 - The parental rights guaranteed by this article shall not be denied or abridged on account of disability.
Section 5 - This article shall not be construed to apply to a parental action or decision that would end life.
On the surface these all sound fairly good, seemingly they are rights protecting our decisions as parents. Well let’s go a little beneath the surface and break down what these sections are saying. I read an article by Publius Huldah published on freedomoutpost.com. He analyzed the amendment and broke down section by section of what these really mean. He warns us
The name, “parental rights amendment” (PRA), sounds so good! But it actually strips parents of their God-delegated authority over their children, and transfers that authority to the federal government.
In order to understand this, you must first learn about “enumerated powers”.
He then goes on to explain when We The People established and ordained the U.S. Constitution we itemized - enumerated every power We delegated to each branch of the federal government over the Country at Large. All other powers were retained by The State or The People. Meaning we only delegated “few and defined” powers to the federal government, none of which included power over children, their care and their upbringing. It has no lawful authority over these objects.
So could it be that the federal government is trying to obtain lawful authority over the care and upbringing of children through this proposed amendment? Let’s look at two observations he lists:
1 . Parents have Responsibilities to their children, not “rights” over them.
The Creator God who – as recognized by the Signers of our Declaration of Independence – endowed us with unalienable Rights; also assigned to parents specific responsibilities to their children. Among these are:
- Provision for children: 2 Corinthians 12:14; Proverbs 13:22; 1 Timothy 5:8; 2 Thessalonians 3:10-12.
- Education and moral instruction of children: Proverbs 1:8-9, 6:20-21, 13:1, 22:6 & 23:19-22; Genesis 18:19; Deuteronomy 4:9-10 & 6:1-7; Ephesians 6:1-4; 2 Timothy 1:5 & 3:15-17.
- Discipline of children: Proverbs 13: 24, 15:5, 19:18, 22:15, 23:12-14, 29:15-17; Hebrews 12:5-11; Colossians 3:21.
Parents are supposed to provide for, care for, teach, protect, and educate their children. NOT civil government!
2 . The Judicial Power of the Federal Courts
Article III, Sec. 2, cl. 1, U.S. Constitution, enumerates the powers of the federal courts:
“The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;…”
“Judicial Power” refers to the power of courts to hear and decide cases.
Amendments are part of the Constitution. Thus, federal courts have power to decide issues addressed by Amendments.
Huldah continues with his warning,
The PRA would transform “families” and “children” from matters over which the federal government now has no lawful authority to matters under the total control of the federal government.
The PRA is a delegation of lawmaking power over families and children to the federal government. Congress may make whatever laws it pleases pertaining to YOUR children; the Executive Branch may issue whatever rules or orders it pleases pertaining to YOUR children – and under Section 3 of the PRA, federal judges will decide whether these laws, orders & rules serve the government’s interest. If so, you lose.
Lawsuits involving these matters would become cases “arising under this Constitution”, or “Laws of the United States”, or “Treaties”, which would ultimately be decided by five (5) judges on the supreme Court. The authority of millions and millions of American parents would be transferred to five (5) judges on the supreme Court.
That Court has a long history of perverting every word of our Constitution it touches. It is suicidal to transfer Family Authority to that Court.
He breaks down every section of The Parental Rights Amendment but I want to focus on Section 3 - Neither the United States nor any State shall infringe these rights without demonstrating that its governmental interest as applied to the person is of the highest order and not otherwise served.
What this means is if the federal judges decide the federal and state governments have a good reason to infringe (violate, break, restrict) your parental rights it will happen. No matter what rights we think we have they can be easily stripped away.
This sounds to me like a no win situation. If the governments can go around our “parental rights” as easily as with a decision from a judge then why bother? Should we support this amendment and put our rights into the hands of the federal government giving them that “power” over our families? Is The Parental Rights Amendment deceitful and manipulative?
Conclusion
I wrote this post to reach out to this community because I know you all research, read and analyze information. The @familyprotection project has really inspired me to look deeper into things and really find out what’s going on. There are so many of us working together to raise awareness on family matters and keeping our families safe from government agencies that try to tear them apart. If you haven’t yet, please take the time to visit @familyprotection’s blog to read the stories, and support this foundation. I strongly support their initiative and all of their efforts in helping families stay together. A little from a lot of people goes a long way. Please support in anyway you can.
This here before us is a major deal. If this amendment is passed it will be listed in the U.S. Constitution. I have not made any steps to support this amendment. I first wanted to come to you all and ask for your thoughts, opinions and feedback on this. I am really questioning if this amendment will do more damage than repair. If any of you have already been looking into this matter please chime in and have a conversation to inform us on your findings. Thanks in advance ~
are using "Child Protection Agencies"
to take children away from loving families
and place them in foster care or group homes.
THESE FAMILIES NEED PROTECTING.
Thank-you @crosheille for bringing awareness to this initiative.
Absolutely! Awareness is key to protecting our families!! These deceitful schemes need to be uncovered.
Thank you for sharing this this with us @crosheille.
You have done an amazing job at bringing this to peoples attention, the time and effort you must have put in to tearing this amendment apart really shows.
If I lived in the US, I would be very cautious of The Parental Rights Amendment, especially section 3 like you say.
Thank you for supporting @familyprotection, we are so greatful to have you by our side as we try to raise awareness and keep families together.
Bless.
Absolutely Mark! I’m so glad I found someone that had broken this down. I’m really glad I looked more into this before supporting it.
I met a HSLDA lawyer in person 2 years ago at a homeschool conference. I have his email and he told me if I ever have any concerns or questions to email him directly. I think I will reach out to him with these concerns since they support ParentsRights.org. If I gain more knowledge or info on this I will be sure to do an update for everyone. Thank you for your continued support as well :)
Am not yet a parent but I can relate with this article and know the pain every parent will feel if the rights to their is taken away. I hope to write more for family protection soon. Its been a long time I did. Well done on a job weldone my friend.
Thank you so much for your feedback! It will be very painful for all parents. I’ll look forward to your articles. Thank you so much for reading and for your support.
Firstly, thanks for bringing this up @crosheille, I have always admired the strong inclination of people to Probe All Things.
PRA seems on the surface to be a beautiful amendment but deep down on every possible condition, most are just schemes to plug parents more!.
My few years of experience studying and researching laws have showed immensely how laws are SWEET-PLAYED into the masses mind!. Those sections are mostly worded to lure the mind of the "Average Parent" into stamping their support without understanding the binding consequences. Sadly, Right this moment, many parents might have already started ringing bells of support for it. Well, we all go back to the drawing board and look through much more intently, because once once laws are passed, parents will be dealing with a lot they can't chew.!.
Thanks Again @crosheille
They really do make these things look good to us. It’s just so sad how they lure us with wording. I am sure too that many parents are already on board with this. I’m so glad I posted this here today to get some valuable feedback from my fellow “awake” Steemicans. I know now that this a deceptive way for the governments to gain more control over us. Thank you so much for chiming in and confirming what I thought. Wow this is crazy, almost everything that’s meant to be good is really out to control us. I’m so sick of all the deceiving.
Parental rights are a God given right. The should not be legislated by government. There is an all out war on against the family and the right to parent. Look in the media. Dads are made fun of, women are glorified and the government is the big step dad who will raise your kid with socialism. At what point will we stand up and say enough is enough. Privacy has been disrespected and the erosion of it continues. It saddens my heart and articles like this help to keep the issue in the open. Thanks for sharing.
I totally agree with you @enjoywithtroy! Our rights are God given and should not be tampered with or taken away by anyone. The family unit is made as a joke these days, the value of it is not honored as it should be. It does seem the roles of man and woman are changing. How many fathers are still the head of their homes? On TV they lie and say the women are in charge.
Thank you for taking the time to read and give your feedback on this. It is very sad the lies and trickery that are before us.
I recall the words of Leonard Henderson when he said
This is what is increasingly dominating our society now. The call to Stand against this interest group is becoming louder, and many need to heed.
"They" look at it like this - you are born with the God given right to parent your children, but then you became a Citizen (synonym to Subject) and gave up those rights. If you do not like your 'fathers' house, then you are welcome to leave. I'm not arguing for or against, I just want people to realize 'why' Parental Rights are civil rights (granted privileges). Once people realize why it is they have the alleged 'legal' authority to whatever it is they want, then people can quit whacking at the limbs of liberty and head for the root.
This just shows how important it is to really investigate something before deciding if it is an improvement or a huge step backwards.
Thanks for taking the time to do this research and posting about it.
It really is important! I was so thrilled when I first read the email but as I dug deeper it made me more concerned than ever.
Absolutely! Thank you for reading and supporting. It’s great to get all of this feedback because I wanted to be sure I wasn’t reading into this wrong. It seems like so far most people agree this does raise concerns for our rights.
Wow, thanks for bringing this to our attention. I have never heard of it! It does sound like it will strip parents of their rights to raise their children as they like. Especially the third point where the government can step in whenever they think what you're doing isn't what they agree with. Yikes!! I do not want to have to run everything by the government concerning my children. So crazy that it has such a good sounding name, but really may be a malicious addition to the constitution. Thanks for the post and all the research!
Absolutely! I was wondering how many have heard about this. Yes that third section doesn’t sound too good at all. I’m really hoping people will root against this. I’m so glad I researched before jumping right in...whew that wouldn’t have been good. Thanks so much for reading and I’m am glad to inform everyone about what’s going on.
Government doesn't see it as 'stripping' your rights, they see it as you voluntarily gave away your rights. Codifying what has always been. Court systems around the world have ruled for years, that Citizens have NO standing to sue the Government. When people argue their "Constitutional Rights", the Judges often remind them they are not "a party to the constitution", instead Citizens are Subjects of the Constitution.
I haven’t done any research other than reading your posts, but my initial thoughts are this could be quite a concern if passed, it does seem to take away rights that to me should be placed in the hands of parents
Thank you so much for your feedback JJ! I agree! It is very concerning.
please do further updates although our kids are all grown up I am curious for the grandkids
I sure will! I can definitely understand your curiosity! This is very important for us to get to the bottom to so we will know what actions to take.
Absolutly this could have such a huge impact on a vast majority of the population as I see it
Absolutely!!!!!
Isn't it just like the government to attempt to slip through more legislation to "protect" us, when what they are really doing is tightening the chains! It does not surprise me at all. Blessings to parents like you who are awake and aware of what is being done to us and our children!
It sure is just like the government. It’s just like what we’ve been sharing about different agencies. It seems they are always disguised as good when they really have the opposite motives. It’s really scary because when you first look at this it makes you want to hurry and jump right on board. But when you really look at what’s going on and read between the fine lines it’s really a reality check. Blessings to you as well, thank you~
I love to see people coming together to protect children. Many people do not have a grasp on standing.
We have infinite rights, including the right to give away our rights, aka 'Citizens', in return for Privileges. Any right granted by Congress is a Civil Right, and can later be un-granted. They can grant you the right, until you do something they don't like and then take away the civil right (privilege).
Section 3 is this is 'their' way of spelling out that your rights can be taken away. All 'they' have to do is deem 'Vaccines' of interest of the highest order, and you no longer have the right to decide for yourself.
Yes I am so glad to be apart of a community that is bringing awareness and trying to help protect families. Thank you so much for your comment. I definitely agree with what you said. As soon as we do something they don’t like those granted rights will be taken away. It seems as if laws that sound good are too good to be true. There is always a hidden agenda.