I 
111TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 2218 
To prohibit the use of Federal funds for any universal or mandatory mental 
health screening program. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
APRIL 30, 2009 
Mr. PAUL (for himself, Mr. BARTLETT, Mr. BURTON of Indiana, Mrs. 
BLACKBURN, Mr. MCCOTTER, and Mr. HENSARLING) introduced the fol-
lowing bill; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Com-
merce, and in addition to the Committees on Ways and Means and Edu-
cation and Labor, for a period to be subsequently determined by the 
Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within 
the jurisdiction of the committee concerned 
A BILL 
To prohibit the use of Federal funds for any universal or 
mandatory mental health screening program. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Parental Consent Act 
of 2009’’. 
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
The Congress finds as follows: 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00001
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
(1) The United States Preventive Services Task 
Force (USPSTF) issued findings and recommenda-
tions against screening for suicide that corroborate 
those of the Canadian Preventive Services Task 
Force. ‘‘USPSTF found no evidence that screening 
for suicide risk reduces suicide attempts or mor-
tality. There is limited evidence on the accuracy of 
screening tools to identify suicide risk in the primary 
care setting, including tools to identify those at high 
risk.’’. 
(2) The 1999 Surgeon General’s report on men-
tal health admitted the serious conflicts in the med-
ical literature regarding the definitions of mental 
health and mental illness when it said, ‘‘In other 
words, what it means to be mentally healthy is sub-
ject to many different interpretations that are rooted 
in value judgments that may vary across cultures. 
The challenge of defining mental health has stalled 
the development of programs to foster mental health 
(Secker, 1998). . . .’’. 
(3) A 2005 report by the National Center for 
Infant and Early Childhood Health Policy admitted, 
with respect to the psychiatric screening of children 
from birth to age 5, the following: ‘‘We have men-
tioned a number of the problems for the new field 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00002
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
of IMH [Infant Mental Health] throughout this 
paper, and many of them complicate examining out-
comes.’’. Briefly, such problems include: 
(A) Lack of baseline. 
(B) Lack of agreement about diagnosis. 
(C) Criteria for referrals or acceptance 
into services are not always well defined. 
(D) Lack of longitudinal outcome studies. 
(E) Appropriate assessment and treatment 
requires multiple informants involved with the 
young child: parents, clinicians, child care staff, 
preschool staff, medical personnel, and other 
service providers. 
(F) Broad parameters for determining 
socioemotional outcomes are not clearly defined, 
although much attention is now being given to 
school readiness. 
(4) Authors of the bible of psychiatric diag-
nosis, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, admit 
that the diagnostic criteria for mental illness are 
vague, saying, ‘‘DSM–IV criteria remain a con-
sensus without clear empirical data supporting the 
number of items required for the diagnosis. . . . Fur-
thermore, the behavioral characteristics specified in 
DSM–IV, despite efforts to standardize them, re-
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00003
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
main subjective. . . .’’ (American Psychiatric Asso-
ciation Committee on the Diagnostic and Statistical 
Manual (DSM–IV 1994), pp. 1162–1163). 
(5) Because of the subjectivity of psychiatric di-
agnosis, it is all too easy for a psychiatrist to label 
a person’s disagreement with the psychiatrist’s polit-
ical beliefs a mental disorder. 
(6) Efforts are underway to add a diagnosis of 
‘‘extreme intolerance’’ to the Diagnostic and Statis-
tical Manual. Prisoners in the California State penal 
system judged to have this extreme intolerance 
based on race or sexual orientation are considered to 
be delusional and are being medicated with anti-psy-
chotic drugs. (Washington Post 12/10/05) 
(7) At least one federally funded school violence 
prevention program has suggested that a child who 
shares his or her parent’s traditional values may be 
likely to instigate school violence. 
(8) Despite many statements in the popular 
press and by groups promoting the psychiatric label-
ing and medication of children, that ADD/ADHD is 
due to a chemical imbalance in the brain, the 1998 
National Institutes of Health Consensus Conference 
said, ‘‘. . . further research is necessary to firmly es-
tablish ADHD as a brain disorder. This is not 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00004
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
unique to ADHD, but applies as well to most psy-
chiatric disorders, including disabling diseases such 
as schizophrenia. . . . Although an independent diag-
nostic test for ADHD does not exist. . . . Finally, 
after years of clinical research and experience with 
ADHD, our knowledge about the cause or causes of 
ADHD remains speculative.’’. 
(9) There has been a precipitous increase in the 
prescription rates of psychiatric drugs in children: 
(A) The use of antipsychotic medication in 
children has increased nearly fivefold between 
1995 and 2002 with more than 2.5 million chil-
dren receiving these medications, the youngest 
being 18 months old. (Vanderbilt University, 
2006) 
(B) More than 2.2 million children are re-
ceiving more than one psychotropic drug at one 
time with no scientific evidence of safety or ef-
fectiveness. (Medco Health Solutions, 2006) 
(C) More money was spent on psychiatric 
drugs for children than on antibiotics or asthma 
medication in 2003. (Medco Trends, 2004) 
(10) A September 2004 Food and Drug Admin-
istration hearing found that more than two-thirds of 
studies of antidepressants given to depressed chil-
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00005
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
dren showed that they were no more effective than 
placebo, or sugar pills, and that only the positive 
trials were published by the pharmaceutical industry. 
The lack of effectiveness of antidepressants has been 
known by the Food and Drug Administration since 
at least 2000 when, according to the Food and Drug 
Administration Background Comments on Pediatric 
Depression, Robert Temple of the Food and Drug 
Administration Office of Drug Evaluation acknowl-
edged the ‘‘preponderance of negative studies of 
antidepressants in pediatric populations’’. The Sur-
geon General’s report said of stimulant medication 
like Ritalin, ‘‘However, psychostimulants do not ap-
pear to achieve long-term changes in outcomes such 
as peer relationships, social or academic skills, or 
school achievement.’’. 
(11) The Food and Drug Administration finally 
acknowledged by issuing its most severe Black Box 
Warnings in September 2004, that the newer 
antidepressants are related to suicidal thoughts and 
actions in children and that this data was hidden for 
years. A confirmatory review of that data published 
in 2006 by Columbia University’s department of 
psychiatry, which is also the originator of the 
TeenScreen instrument, found that ‘‘in children and 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00006
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
adolescents (aged 6–18 years), antidepressant drug 
treatment was significantly associated with suicide 
attempts . . . and suicide deaths. . . . ’’. The Food 
and Drug Administration had over 2,000 reports of 
completed suicides from 1987 to 1995 for the drug 
Prozac alone, which by the agency’s own calculations 
represent but a fraction of the suicides. Prozac is 
the only such drug approved by the Food and Drug 
Administration for use in children. 
(12) Other possible side effects of psychiatric 
medication used in children include mania, violence, 
dependence, weight gain, and insomnia from the 
newer antidepressants; cardiac toxicity including le-
thal arrhythmias from the older antidepressants; 
growth suppression, psychosis, and violence from 
stimulants; and diabetes from the newer anti-psy-
chotic medications. 
(13) Parents are already being coerced to put 
their children on psychiatric medications and some 
children are dying because of it. Universal or man-
datory mental health screening and the accom-
panying treatments recommended by the New Free-
dom Commission on Mental Health will only in-
crease that problem. Across the country, Patricia 
Weathers, the Carroll Family, the Johnston Family, 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00007
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
and the Salazar Family were all charged or threat-
ened with child abuse charges for refusing or taking 
their children off of psychiatric medications. 
(14) The United States Supreme Court in 
Pierce versus Society of Sisters (268 U.S. 510 
(1925)) held that parents have a right to direct the 
education and upbringing of their children. 
(15) Universal or mandatory mental health 
screening violates the right of parents to direct and 
control the upbringing of their children. 
(16) Federal funds should never be used to sup-
port programs that could lead to the increased over- 
medication of children, the stigmatization of children 
and adults as mentally disturbed based on their po-
litical or other beliefs, or the violation of the liberty 
and privacy of Americans by subjecting them to 
invasive ‘‘mental health screening’’ (the results of 
which are placed in medical records which are avail-
able to government officials and special interests 
without the patient’s consent). 
SEC. 3. PROHIBITION AGAINST FEDERAL FUNDING OF UNI-
VERSAL OR MANDATORY MENTAL HEALTH 
SCREENING. 
(a) UNIVERSAL OR MANDATORY MENTAL HEALTH 
SCREENING PROGRAM.—No Federal funds may be used 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00008
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
to establish or implement any universal or mandatory 
mental health, psychiatric, or socioemotional screening 
program. 
(b) REFUSAL TO CONSENT AS BASIS OF A CHARGE 
OF CHILD ABUSE OR EDUCATION NEGLECT.—No Federal 
education funds may be paid to any local educational 
agency or other instrument of government that uses the 
refusal of a parent or legal guardian to provide express, 
written, voluntary, informed consent to mental health 
screening for his or her child as the basis of a charge of 
child abuse, child neglect, medical neglect, or education 
neglect until the agency or instrument demonstrates that 
it is no longer using such refusal as a basis of such a 
charge. 
(c) DEFINITION.—For purposes of this Act, the term 
‘‘universal or mandatory mental health, psychiatric, or 
socioemotional screening program’’— 
(1) means any mental health screening program 
in which a set of individuals (other than members of 
the Armed Forces or individuals serving a sentence 
resulting from conviction for a criminal offense) is 
automatically screened without regard to whether 
there was a prior indication of a need for mental 
health treatment; and 
(2) includes— 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00009
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6201
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS
(A) any program of State incentive grants 
for transformation to implement recommenda-
tions in the July 2003 report of the New Free-
dom Commission on Mental Health, the State 
Early Childhood Comprehensive System, grants 
for TeenScreen, and the Foundations for 
Learning Grants; and 
(B) any student mental health screening 
program that allows mental health screening of 
individuals under 18 years of age without the 
express, written, voluntary, informed consent of 
the parent or legal guardian of the individual 
involved. 
Æ 
VerDate Nov 24 2008 
18:50 May 03, 2009
Jkt 079200
PO 00000
Frm 00010
Fmt 6652
Sfmt 6301
E:\BILLS\H2218.IH
H2218
rwilkins on PROD1PC63 with BILLS