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[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1503 Introduced in House (IH)]

<DOC>

118th CONGRESS
  2d Session
H. RES. 1503

 Expressing support for the designation of October 2024 as ``National 
                     Youth Justice Action Month''.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           September 25, 2024

   Mr. Cardenas (for himself, Mr. Trone, and Ms. Moore of Wisconsin) 
submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee 
                     on Education and the Workforce

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION

 
 Expressing support for the designation of October 2024 as ``National 
                     Youth Justice Action Month''.

Whereas the historical role of the juvenile court system is to rehabilitate and 
        treat young people while holding them accountable and maintaining public 
        safety, and the juvenile court system is therefore better equipped to 
        work with youth than the adult criminal justice system, which is 
        punitive in nature;
Whereas youth are developmentally different from adults, and those differences 
        have been--

    (1) documented by research on the adolescent brain; and

    (2) acknowledged by the Supreme Court of the United States, State 
supreme courts, and many State and Federal laws that prohibit youth under 
the age of 18 from taking on major adult responsibilities such as voting, 
jury duty, and military service;

Whereas most laws allowing the prosecution of youth as adults were enacted 
        before the publication of research-based evidence by the Centers for 
        Disease Control and Prevention and the Office of Juvenile Justice and 
        Delinquency Prevention of the Department of Justice demonstrating that 
        prosecuting youth in adult court actually decreases public safety as, on 
        average, youth prosecuted in adult court are 34 percent more likely to 
        commit future crimes than youth retained in the juvenile court system;
Whereas youth deserve an opportunity to demonstrate their potential to grow and 
        change, and youth who are placed under the commitment of the juvenile 
        court system too often do not receive access to age-appropriate services 
        and education and remain far from their families, which increases the 
        likelihood that those youth will commit offenses in the future;
Whereas, in the United States, between 2000 to 2022, there was a 75-percent 
        decline in youth incarceration, but troubling disparities remain;
Whereas youth of color, youth with disabilities, youth with mental health 
        challenges, and youth in foster care are disproportionately represented 
        at all stages of the juvenile justice system;
Whereas it is harmful to public safety and to young people in the legal system 
        to confine youth in adult jails or prisons where they are significantly 
        more likely to be physically and sexually assaulted and placed in 
        solitary confinement;
Whereas youth sentenced as adults receive an adult criminal record that hinders 
        future education, housing, and employment opportunities; and
Whereas, in October, people around the United States participate in Youth 
        Justice Action Month to increase public awareness of the impact of the 
        justice system on youth and families and to provide people across the 
        United States with an opportunity to develop action-oriented events in 
        their communities: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
            (1) acknowledges that the collateral consequences normally 
        applied in the adult criminal justice system should not 
        automatically apply to youth arrested for crimes before the age 
        of 18;
            (2) expresses support for the designation of ``National 
        Youth Justice Action Month'';
            (3) recognizes and supports the goals and ideals of 
        National Youth Justice Action Month; and
            (4) recognizes the 50th anniversary of the Juvenile Justice 
        and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974, as amended by the 
        Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 2018, and the importance of 
        reauthorization, funding, and continued implementation of the 
        Act in a manner in keeping with the spirit and intent of the 
        law.
                                 <all>
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