Week of June 3rd – June 7th
House session June 5th -6th!
Contact your state representatives about these important bills coming up.
CORNERSTONE POSITION: OPPOSED This is a calculated business endeavor premised on extracting profits from addicted gamblers. This is neither a healthy nor ethical way to collect revenue for the state. Read our position here.
Minority Report: “The minority of the committee felt that, even as amended, the bill brought into the state a new form of charitable gaming significantly different from the established forms, which are generally more social in nature and less susceptible to compulsive solo play. The minority felt that the purported differences between these machines and slot machines were minor and technical, and that as far as potential players were concerned, there is no significant difference. The minority felt that these machines would bring in a new potentially addictive form of gambling not already common in the state and had concerns about local control of this new form of gaming in communities that already have charitable gaming.”
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Ask your state representative to overturn the committee majority report, and instead vote inexpedient to legislate.
CORNERSTONE POSITION: We took no position on this bill earlier in the session, but for this vote, we support the committee minority’s recommendation of “ought to pass with amendment” (amendment #1789h as printed in House Calendar). The bill is about collecting data on several health conditions. If state public health officials can collect data about other conditions while protecting patient privacy, they should certainly be able to do so about abortion. As the committee minority report says, “This bill is good, but is incomplete without data for pregnancy termination.”
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Ask your state representative to overturn the committee majority’s recommendation, and instead support the committee minority’s report of “ought to pass with amendment.”
CORNERSTONE POSITION: OPPOSED No one wants invidious discrimination in schools. SB 263 does not attack the problem of discrimination, however. It poses more questions than solutions, and it requires far more serious study than it has received so far in the legislature. See “Gender Politics Goes to School,” Cornerstone’s most recent commentary on the bill.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Ask your state representative to overturn the committee report, and instead vote inexpedient to legislate.
CORNERSTONE POSITION: OPPOSED The Senate amendment improves the bill, but does not go far enough to ensure that assisted suicide is ruled out as a topic for study. We cannot allow a bill that would usher in physician assisted suicide.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Ask your state representatives to non-concur with the Senate version, and do not request a committee of conference.
The House will be asked to concur with the Senate amendment to the bill.
CORNERSTONE POSITION: OPPOSED. Vital records exist to document facts, not feelings about one’s own age, sex, or place of birth. For more information including the text of the amendment the Senate adopted, see the blog post on the Cornerstone website.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Ask your state representative to non-concur with the Senate version and do not request a committee of conference.
Tell Governor Sununu it’s time to take out his veto pen!
STATUS: The House concurred with the Senate amendment to HB 669, the bill to allow an “x” as a gender designation on drivers’ licenses and non-driver IDs. The bill will spend the next few days in a technical process called enrollment, and after that, it will go to the Governor.
CORNERSTONE POSITION: OPPOSED. The bill would allow a gender notation of M, F, or X (meaning non-binary or “other”) on drivers’ licenses and state-issued non-driver IDs. It makes no sense to allow a subjective feeling to determine the data appearing on such documents. Read Cornerstone’s testimony on HB 669.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: If you have not already done so, call the Governor at (603) 271-2121 or send him a message asking him to VETO HB 669. Not to be swayed by appeals to “compassion” for people who identify as neither male nor female. The information on a driver’s license has never before been dictated by feelings.
Update on Recent Legislative Action
Bills we have been following, that are now on to the next steps. Your voice still needed and still matters!
GOOD NEWS! HB 481 was re-referred to committee stopping HB 481 from becoming law this year!
The motion to re-refer was approved by the full Senate on May 30th. This victory is due in no small part to the overwhelming support we have gotten against HB 481!
CORNERSTONE POSITION: OPPOSED to the bill, thus in support of the re-refer motion. Enabling widespread use of recreational marijuana PRIVATIZES THE GAINS AND SOCIALIZES THE LOSSES of marijuana commercialization. HB 481 is wrong for New Hampshire.
STATUS: Passed the Senate with amendment on May 30th. Now it must go to the House for concurrence.
CORNERSTONE POSITION: OPPOSED. HB 480 would expand legal gambling, in a manner that makes the state rely on gambling addiction in order to make sports betting a reliable state revenue source. Read Cornerstone’s op-ed, “Gambling With Our People.”
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Call your Representatives! Urge them to recommend non-concur & no request for conference committee.
