The purpose of this Advocacy Report is twofold:
- To provide the essential historical, legal, and policy analysis necessary for a legislative campaign to repeal the Massachusetts religious exemption law.
- To identify and rebut the primary arguments used by groups opposing repeal of the Massachusetts exemption law.
Proponents of religious exemption laws have developed many unsupported, yet reasonable sounding arguments which they skillfully employ to influence public and legislative opinion. This Report seeks to expose, in detail, the many contradictions and distortions contained in the arguments of those who demand that parents have the right, for religious reasons, to deprive their children of necessary medical care even at the cost of preventable suffering, disability, and death.