By:  Vowell                                            H.B. No. 969
       73R4166 T
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to corporal punishment in public schools.
    1-3        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-4        SECTION 1.  Subchapter I, Chapter 21, Education Code, is
    1-5  amended by adding Section 21.310 to read as follows:
    1-6        Sec. 21.310.  CORPORAL PUNISHMENT.  (a)  An employee of a
    1-7  public school may not use or authorize the use of corporal
    1-8  punishment to discipline a student without the prior written
    1-9  consent of the student's parent or guardian.
   1-10        (b)  In this section, "corporal punishment" includes hitting,
   1-11  spanking, or slapping a student with a hand or with an object.
   1-12        (c)  An employee of a public school may use reasonable and
   1-13  necessary physical restraining techniques for the purpose of:
   1-14              (1)  preventing a student from injuring a person or
   1-15  property;
   1-16              (2)  self-defense; or
   1-17              (3)  obtaining possession, from a pupil, of a weapon or
   1-18  other dangerous object.
   1-19        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-20  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-21  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-22  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-23  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   1-24  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
    2-1  passage, and it is so enacted.