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By Pamela G. Lichty and A. Joris Watland

If a woman in Hawaii were raped today and sought emergency contraception, she likely could not obtain it from a hospital, no matter how well-insured or willing to pay she was. If she then became pregnant and kept the child, she could not safeguard her child by making her same-sex partner the child’s parent. The rapist would likely escape without penalty: Hawaii’s Crime Prevention division estimates that less than half of rapists are caught. On the other hand, if an 18 year old is convicted for stealing an iPod and then is caught later for attempting to sell counterfeit sunglasses, the 18 year old will be sent to a prison (brimming with hardened criminals) for no less than one year and eight months. That prison stay would cost taxpayers about $60,000.

As the 2011 legislative session opens, we must push the Legislature to protect and advance fundamental civil rights that affect our everyday lives and go far to ensure safe, healthy and free communities:

1. Require hospitals to provide women with emergency contraception following rape;
2. Establish civil unions for same-sex couples;
3. Eliminate mandatory minimum sentences;
4. Affirm the rights of all Hawaii’s citizens to vote; and
5. Support sick and dying individuals with improvements to the medical cannabis program.

By passing legislation to advance these civil rights, the Legislature will help to protect our most vulnerable residents, strengthen our families, and secure our communities.

• The Legislature should require hospitals to provide rape victims with information about and access to emergency contraception.

After being raped, women often go to hospitals seeking medical care, including testing for sexually transmitted diseases and emergency contraception to prevent pregnancy. However, many hospitals in Hawaii do not provide emergency contraception and/or lack sufficient supplies. Immediate access is absolutely necessary, as emergency contraception is only effective at preventing pregnancy if taken soon after the rape. Without emergency contraception, a woman who has been raped may have to make an excruciating decision as to whether to bear the rapist’s child.

Ensuring rape victims’ access to emergency contraception gives women a security blanket when they most need it – immediately after a rape. Legislation will be introduced this session that seeks to mandate that all hospitals provide rape victims with information and access to emergency contraception. By mitigating the consequences of rape as best we can, we make the community safer for every woman.

• The Legislature should establish civil unions that provide same-sex couples with the rights, benefits and responsibilities currently offered to opposite-sex married couples.

Hawaii law currently provides same-sex couples only the option of entering into an inadequate “reciprocal beneficiary” (“RB”) relationship. RBs don’t provide comprehensive protection for same-sex couples and their families, particularly in areas like parenting, financial stability and relationship dissolution. These protections are not necessary or appropriate for many couples in RB relationships (such as siblings). Opposite-sex married couples have access to hundreds of protections, benefits, and responsibilities under Hawaii law, but RBs only have access to 60.

Legislation will be introduced to create a new “civil union” status that provides same-sex (and opposite sex) couples the rights, benefits, obligations and responsibilities that they need to ensure their family’s unity, security and stability. Enacting this legislation will provide a safety net for same-sex couples and their families and will ultimately strengthen our families and communities.

• The Legislature should eliminate mandatory minimum sentences.

Overincarceration hurts individuals and communities rather than helps. Exiling people from their communities by inappropriately incarcerating them endangers our communities by increasing the chance that these offenders grow into the hardened, violent ones that surround them in prison. Studies have shown that family and community involvement reduce recidivism, yet our penal system insists on incarceration as the only way to deal with offenders. Incarceration stymies offenders’ chances at reintegration and poses dangerous risks to our communities when these offenders are eventually released.

The legislature can make our communities safer by repealing mandatory minimum sentences in favor of health-based, long term solutions, thereby allowing judges to decide appropriate punishment, reducing prison crowding and creating a path towards health and rehabilitation.

• The Legislature should pass comprehensive voting rights legislation.

The Legislature should establish a statutory right to vote for all Hawaii’s citizens. This legislation would allow incarcerated individuals to vote – reversing Civil War-era legislation instituted on the mainland to disenfranchise minorities. As incarcerated individuals become reinvested and engaged in their communities, they will be less likely to reoffend in those communities after their release.

• The Legislature should improve Hawaii’s medical cannabis program.

The Legislature should improve the medical cannabis program so that sick and dying individuals can access their medicine legally and without fear of incarceration. Among other things, the Legislature should develop a dispensary program so that sick patients are able to legally obtain their medicine without having to grow it themselves or turn to the black market.

This legislation would not only increase patients’ access to medicine and reduce crime, but would also (assuming the Legislature levied a tax on this particular medicine) yield millions of dollars annually in new State revenue.

By passing legislation to protect and advance civil rights, we can create a collectively stronger community fabric. Mandating emergency contraception protects our most vulnerable when they are most desperate. Creating same- sex civil unions strengthens the bonds of our families that form our communities. Eliminating mandatory minimum sentences and promoting community investment by allowing incarcerated individuals to vote enables offenders to become productive, law-abiding citizens. Improving the medical cannabis program will allow our sick and dying residents to legally access their medicine. Protecting and advancing civil rights is the recipe for healthy and safe families and communities.

Pamela G. Lichty and A. Joris Watland are members of the ACLU-Hawaii’s Legislative Committee