Conservatives Want Adoption Vote

The head of the Arkansas Family Council said today that his organization will try to put a measure banning homosexuals from adopting or fostering children on the 2008 ballot.

Council executive director Jerry Cox says the group is to submit a proposed ballot title to the attorney general’s office in the coming weeks. Cox says a draft of the ban has not been completed, but it would be similar to a ban that was defeated in the Legislature earlier this year.

Legislation barring homosexuals and unmarried couples from fostering or adopting passed the Senate, but failed before the House Judiciary Committee during this year’s session. The measure would have reinstated a ban on gay foster parents struck down by the Arkansas Supreme Court last year.

To place a proposed constitutional amendment on the ballot, supporters would have to gather signatures equal to ten percent of the ballots cast in last year’s governor’s election, or about 78,000. An initiated act would require eight percent of the votes cast, or around 62,000 signatures. First, though, the measure’s language must be approved by Attorney General Dustin McDaniel’s office.

Source: Associated Press