Break out the tear gas, boys
As a newspaper reporter way back in the 1970s, one or two of the towns I used to cover came up with “parental responsibility laws,” making parents criminally liable for offenses committed by their children. Did that produce some wild politics!
As I recall it, none of these acts made it into the legal code: too much opposition. But that was then, and now is now. That which failed back then is now succeeding.
Gloucester Township has passed a Parental Responsibility Act. No one has yet been arrested and charged for children’s misdeeds. But it’s early days–plenty of time to drum up bitter courtroom battles.
What goes around comes around.
The press for a parental responsibility law picked up momentum last year, in the wake of a… let’s call it a youth riot… that ruined a municipal celebration that this year couldn’t be held. Whether it’ll ever be held again remains to be seen.