State Trades Abstinence for Abandonment Education
Posted August 23, 2007

On Tuesday, Governor Corzine signed into law A-277/S-1621, which mandates that public schools and school board educational programs serving students grades 7-12 distribute pamphlets, posters, and educational materials regarding the New Jersey Safe Haven Infant Protection Act.

New Jersey enacted the Safe Haven Infant Protection Act on August 7, 2000, becoming the fifth state in the nation to do so. Under the Act, parents who are unwilling to care for their babies may bring an infant who is fewer than 30 days old to a hospital emergency room or police station in New Jersey. Unless the baby shows signs of intentional abuse, the parents may leave the baby with no questions asked.

The NJFPC is a strong supporter of Safe Haven laws, as they provide vital support that pregnant women so often need in order to choose life for their unborn babies. Through Safe Haven laws, babies who might otherwise be killed in utero or abandoned in trash bins are given a chance at life under the protection of loving caregivers.

While we wholeheartedly support New Jersey’s Safe Haven Act, we question the priorities of a state that, on one hand, will require providing information to 7 th - 12 th graders on no-fault abandonment of newborns while, on the other hand, will reject $800,000 in abstinence education funding to prevent teenage pregnancies from occurring in the first place.

If you will recall, in October of last year, New Jersey health and education officials sent a “Thanks but No Thanks” letter to US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt. In the letter, state officials indicated that the federal funding for abstinence education was not welcome in New Jersey due to its accompanying requirements, which purportedly violated New Jersey sex education and HIV/AIDS education standards.

This marked the first time since 1996 that the state had rejected the abstinence education funding. State officials cited dual reasons for the flip. First, new requirements attached to the funding would have prevented teachers from discussing contraception. Under the New Jersey AIDS Prevention Act, such discussion is permitted. Second, funding provisions required teachers to state that sex within the boundaries of marriage is “the expected standard of sexual activity.”

Apparently, this was unacceptable to New Jersey. State Health Commissioner Fred Jacobs noted, “Monogamy is not a bad idea, but having the government of New Jersey dictate these things for families is not something we wish to do.” According to Jacobs, “It isn’t the function of the state government to create standards (for sexual activity).”

There is something fundamentally wrong with a system that will expend time, energy, and finances to educate teenagers on how safely to give up their babies while at the same time will refuse hundreds of thousands of dollars to protect young people from pregnancies – not to mention a myriad of sexually transmitted diseases and lifelong emotional scars – in the first place.

The NJFPC believes that Commissioner Jacob’s position is fundamentally flawed as well. The state government has created standards for sexual activity. They are called Comprehensive Health and Physical Education Core Curriculum Content Standards for grades 1 through 12. Apparently, it is only viewpoints the state deems to be politically incorrect that get short shrift.

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