Unfortunately for the state's children, legislators passed House Bill 338, which its sponsor had portrayed throughout the session as simply a philosophical adoption of U.S. Supreme Court language that is "already the law of the land." That characterization is misleading, according to a state assistant attorney general who has prosecuted cases of child abuse.

Alain Balmanno warned senators debating the bill in the session's final hours that it will "destroy" the state's child welfare system. Its requirements that caseworkers use the "least restrictive" means when intervening to protect a child and only when a parent's actions pose "immediate" harm would dangerously restrict the state's ability to help a child who is at risk.

The deceptively simple bill would also make it difficult, if not impossible, to prosecute parents, even when the evidence shows they have harmed a child or put him in danger.

Senators should have heeded Balmanno's warning and, at least, postponed action on the bill pending further study. Since they did not, Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. should veto it.

Fortunately, House Bill 202 was defeated. In its original form, the bill would have radically changed the definitions of abuse and neglect and made it much more difficult for caseworkers to intervene when they suspected a child was being harmed.

It is to legislators' credit that they demanded amendments and substitutions to remove the bill's most onerous provisions and finally let it die. The Legislature also passed Senate Bill 83, creating a new standard for the state to prove medical neglect. Child welfare officials believe it will not affect their work, which suggests it was unnecessary.

All three bills are responses to the 2003 case of Parker Jensen, a boy whose parents fought with the state for the right to refuse chemotherapy for Parker after he was was diagnosed with a virulent form of cancer. The state ultimately dropped its case against the parents.

Legislators used Parker as an example of how the state can threaten the right of loving parents to raise their children however they see fit. But HB338 puts children at risk of being abused or neglected by irresponsible or sadistic parents, those whose existence legislators sometimes fail to acknowledge.