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OREGON, January 24, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – News from Oregon that Governor Kate Brown is on board with a bill which would require invasive home visits by state employees to all households with newborns has sent shockwaves across the nation.

While the proposed legislation, known as Senate Bill 526, remains in a nascent form with very few published details, it has nonetheless generated great excitement among progressive statists while sending chills down the spines of parents and families who fear increased government interference in their private lives.

The controversial bill directs the Oregon Health Authority “to study home visiting by licensed health care providers.” It has also been given “emergency” status, meaning that action must be taken before the end of this year.

The “emergency” designation has an oddly ominous tone, stating that the measure is “necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety,” so “an emergency is declared to exist.”

“What’s the big emergency?” asked Paula Bolyard in an opinion piece penned for PJ Media.

“Apparently, the state of Oregon is concerned that some parents are raising their children without the watchful eye of Big Brother monitoring their every move – a big no-no in the view of the progressive left,” continued Bolyard.

“It’s frightening to think about what would happen to parents who refuse such visits,” noted Bolyard. She added:

As someone who has been involved in the homeschooling movement for more than 20 years, I have seen many attempts to increase the oversight of children taught at home by requiring home visits by a teacher or social worker. The basic premise behind these attempted power grabs is that parents cannot be trusted with the care of their own children — that an agent of the state is the only one qualified to ensure that children are being properly cared for. Without such surveillance, proponents argue, children are at risk for abuse and neglect, something they believe government agents can prevent, despite volumes of evidence to the contrary. In Oregon, in fact, children in the foster care system are abused at twice the national rate. One wonders how a state that can’t handle the children currently in its care could possibly manage to surveil an additional 40,000 children per year, let alone pay for such a program (answer: it can’t).

The proposed bill is a continuation of policies straight out of the Obama White House which aggressively sought to nudge Americans toward accepting ever-increasing government involvement in their private lives.

With the introduction of its Julia website, the Obama Administration demonstrated how a person could be wholly government dependent, from birth until death. The site was short-lived as Americans recoiled from its premise, with even CNN calling it the “Wrong vision for America.”

Statists do not trust parents to raise children without government’s invasive guidance

Patrick Allen, Director of the Oregon Health Authority, made it clear in a statement to the Beaverton Valley Times that this is not just about helping parents and children living on the edge, who might need recourse to government aid.

“This isn’t something for people in trouble,” said Allen.

“When the program is complete, every new parent — this includes adoptions — would receive a series of two or three visits by someone like a nurse or other health care practitioner,” noted Allen.

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