(4) Accurate mental health diagnosis of chil-
dren is difficult as admitted by the Surgeon Gen-
eral’s report that says, ‘‘The science is challenging 
because of the ongoing process of development. The 
normally developing child hardly stays the same long 
enough to make stable measurements. Adult criteria 
for illness can be difficult to apply to children and 
adolescents, when the signs and symptoms of mental 
disorders are often also the characteristics of normal 
development.’’. 
(5) 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 consensus 
without clear empirical data supporting the number 
of items required for the diagnosis. . . . Further-
more, the behavioral characteristics specified in 
DSM-IV, despite efforts to standardize them, remain 
subjective. . . .’’ (American Psychiatric Association 
Committee on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual 
(DSM–IV 1994), pp. 1162–1163). 
(6) 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.
(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 
establish ADHD as a brain disorder. This is not 
unique to ADHD, but applies as well to most psy-
chiatric disorders, including disabling diseases such 
as schizophrenia. . . . Although an independent di-
agnostic 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) A 300-percent increase in psychotropic 
drug use in 2 to 4 year old children from 1991 
to 1995 (Journal of the American Medical As-
sociation, 2000).
(B) A 300-percent increase in psychotropic 
drug use in children from 1987 to 1996 (Ar-
chives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, 
2003). 
(C) More money was spent on psychiatric 
drugs for children than on antibiotics or asthma 
medication (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-
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 in September 2004, that the newer 
antidepressants are related to suicidal thoughts and 
actions in children and that this data was hidden for 
years. The Food and Drug Administration had over 
2000 reports of completed suicides from 1987 to 
1995 for the drug Prozac alone, which by the agen-
cy’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 chil-
dren. 
(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 President’s 
New Freedom Commission on Mental Health will 
only increase that problem. Across the country, Pa-
tricia Weathers, the Carroll Family, the Johnston 
Family, and the Salazar Family were all charged or 
threatened 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).