Legislation

We opposed this legislation which would have greatly increased the tax credit program for businesses that make donations to “scholarship organizations” that funnel money to private and parochial schools for tuition purposes.

While ensuring a healthy workplace is a laudable goal, we opposed a piece of far-reaching and subjective legislation which would have imposed liability on employers or co-workers who, among other actions, provide “persistent criticism.”

We opposed legislation that would have prohibited the outdoor advertising of cannabis, noting that such a restriction on commercial speech concerning a legal substance in RI would undoubtedly be found unconstitutional under the First Amendment.

We strongly opposed a package of bills purporting to enhance parental consent and involvement in their minor’s academic interests, but which instead sought to dictate curricular and educational decisions in ways that are censorious and contrary to fundamental pedagogical principles.

We opposed this bill that purported to prohibit the production and possession of so-called child pornography.

We opposed this bill which would have created a crime of “menacing,” which would make criminal a wide variety of hyperbolic comments regularly expressed by people in the heat of the moment.

We strongly supported this legislation which would have further protected literature with “educational and governmental” value, as well as materials in a “bona fide school, museum, or public library.”

Though we appreciated its laudable goal, we opposed legislation which would require the state Department of Education to offer a kosher meal school lunch option to school districts.

We opposed the legislation because its breadth and statutory coverage potentially interfered with the free speech rights of employers and, just as importantly, the rights of other employees to be free of a hostile work environment.