WHEREAS, we believe that children need parents to lovingly guide their upbringing and education; and

WHEREAS, in 1923, the United States Supreme Court held that the “liberty” protected by the Due Process Clause includes the right of parents to “establish a home and bring up children” and “to control the education of their own”; and

WHEREAS, in 1925, the United States Supreme Court has declared that “The child is not the mere creature of the state; those who nurture him and direct his destiny have the right, coupled with the high duty, to recognize and prepare him for additional obligations”; and

WHEREAS, in 1944, the Court again said, “It is cardinal with us that the custody, care and nurture of the child reside first in the parents, whose primary function and freedom include preparation for obligations the state can neither supply nor hinder”; and

WHEREAS, in 1972, the Court once again proclaimed, “The history and culture of Western civilization reflect a strong tradition of parental concern for the nurture and upbringing of their children. This primary role of the parents in the upbringing of their children is now established beyond debate as an enduring American tradition”; and

WHEREAS, this strong endorsement of parental rights has begun to erode; in 1999, when the Supreme Court said, “The liberty interest at issue in this case-the interest of parents in the care, custody, and control of their children is perhaps the oldest of the fundamental liberty interests recognized by this Court”; only four members of the Court endorsed this statement; and

WHEREAS, in this 1999 decision, Justice Scalia declared that, while he supported parental rights as a political matter, he could not vote as a judge to enforce any unwritten constitutional right, including parental rights; and

WHEREAS, in 2004, the Supreme Court relied on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child to guide a constitutional decision regarding children; and

WHEREAS, other federal courts have already held that the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is binding on the United States even though it has not been ratified; and

WHEREAS, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child would bring an unacceptable regime of governmental control of the parent-child relationship; and

WHEREAS, we believe that the trends to embrace international law are rapidly growing in the judicial system, and, that these trends threaten to transfer political decision-making about families and children from American legislatures to international agencies; and

WHEREAS, we believe that children can and should be protected from abuse or neglect by the continued enforcement of these time-honored constitutional principles governing the parent-child relationship; and

WHEREAS, we believe that if we do not make the Supreme Court’s longstanding recognition of parental rights a part of the actual text of the Constitution, these rights will soon be eroded by judicial drift and international law;

THEREFORE, we call upon the Congress of the United States of America, to propose to the States the following Constitutional Amendment to guarantee that children will continue to have a protected relationship with their parents, not only for our generation, but for the generations to come.

See the draft amendment and sign the petition here: http://www.parentalrights.org/pages/public/petition.aspx