You did it! You settled any question about how deeply you care for the education and welfare of your children by packing the State House and saying “no” to more red tape, more scrutiny, and more suspicion.
Some 1,500 of you crowded the corridors of the State Assembly, bringing with you kids of all ages, heartfelt homemade signs, and a determination to endure the cramped space and Sacramento heat in order to make your message heard.
And for three straight hours, the members of the Education Committee listened. In the end, not one of them voted for collecting more information about homeschools and making that information public.
The legislation in question, Assembly Bill 2756, was one of two bills introduced in reaction to the Turpin case, where parents who filed paperwork to homeschool faced charges of abusing their 13 children. We were shocked and saddened by this case, and we know you were, too.
But we also agreed with you that the legislation proposed in reaction to this tragedy was not the answer. Not only would the bills have failed to protect children, but they would have punished thousands of innocent families who only want the freedom to help their kids thrive.
One homeschool graduate who attended the hearing on A.B. 2756 summed up the sentiment against the bill.
“It’s still basically forming a database of what people are doing, how they’re doing it, how many people they’re doing it for,” local media quoted him as saying. “This is exactly the kind of database that can be mined for more restrictive regulations.” (Read more about the hearing here.)
Our thanks go out to all of you who turned out for this historic evening.
We would also like to thank Family Protection Ministries for helping to coordinate a response to these bills.
This is certainly a victory to savor. But it is also a reminder that freedom is never guaranteed—it must be guarded with vigilance.