Every year during our state’s legislative session (January – April), FACT tracks bills making their way through the Tennessee General Assembly that concern marriage, the family, life, and religious liberty. Each bill that FACT tracks is listed by its individual Senate bill and House bill number within a specific category. 

However, there are two categories of bills this year that are of such paramount importance compared to everything else the legislature might consider that we will only be be tracking them.
 
These two categories of bills deal with what it means to be human. There is nothing more fundamental than the understanding of who we are and why we are here, as that colors the way we look at every other policy issue.  Get this wrong and a lot goes wrong.
 
Specifically, the two categories of bills involve what it means to be male and female. The bills that will define this understanding and usher it into our federal court system through legal challenges to their enactment address (1) the nature of the marital relationship and (2) the nature of the parent-child relationship. 
 
More specifically, how your legislator votes on these two bills will tell you whether he or she believes (1) the marital relationship and the parent-child relationship are strictly a creation of man-made law and that what they are and what they mean depends on a statute or (2) whether those relationships exist prior to and are independent of any human law and that what they are and what they mean does not depend on a statute.
 
In other words, ask yourself this question: Would the husband-wife marital relationship and the rights and duties of parents in relation to their children go away and cease to exist if every statute on martrimony and parent-child were repealed?  If your answer is no, then your position and FACT’s position are aligned; if not, then we are not aligned.
 
We urge you to contact your legislator about these two categories of bills since your input can influence his or her decision.