Two bills that the House and the Senate both agreed on have not made it past Gov. John Lynch. Last week, the governor vetoed SB 318, a measure that would have expanded the right to use deadly force. Under the bill, a person would have had the right to use deadly force to protect himself or herself at any location. Previously, state law allowed the use of deadly force if a person was attacked in his or her home. The law also allowed for a person to use deadly force if they themselves were being attacked with deadly force. In other situations, the victim of an attack had a “duty to retreat” rather than use deadly force.

“This legislation would legalize a host of inappropriate uses of deadly force. This bill would allow a person to use deadly force in response to non-deadly force, even in public places such as shopping malls, public streets, restaurants and churches. This is a dramatic change to our current laws,” Lynch said in a statement.

Lynch also axed HB 345, which would have required potential voters to present a photo ID at the polls before casting their ballots. House and Senate Republicans who supported the measure said it was a safeguard against possible voter fraud. However, Lynch said the bill would limit voters’ rights.

“Our responsibility as elected officials is to protect every citizen’s constitutional right to vote and to ensure that any proposed changes to our voting system do not create unnecessary barriers to voting,” Lynch said in his veto message.

With most of the heavy legislative lifting done for now, House and Senate members will next turn their attention to figuring out some compromises. There are 60 bills headed for a committee of conference this year. This means that both bodies passed their own amended version of a particular bill and will use the committee of conference as a way to work out a compromise. Lawmakers have a week to get everything squared away: the final deadline on the committees is May 24.

Lawmakers will once again tackle the debate over equal parenting plans when HB 529 appears before a committee this week. Legislators have been wrangling with the bill, which encourages state courts to adopt equal parenting plans during custody proceedings, since March 2005. The House passed the bill earlier this year, which set guidelines for the presumption of shared, “equal” custody of a child between parents. However, the bill made one important change to current state law: under the bill, judges and marital masters would have to cite some sort of evidence that shared custody would not be in the child’s best interest. However, the Senate removed this provision after it passed the bill earlier this month.

Rep. David Bickford (R-New Durham) is the bill’s sponsor. He said the Senate’s amendment gutted the bill.
“The purpose of the bill is to require evidence to be used,” he said. “The best interest of the child is still being used, but it’s established through evidence.”

Bickford is unsure if any compromise will be reached, but he said the fact that the Senate agreed to a committee of conference is encouraging.

“They agreed to come to the table and talk, and that’s always a hopeful sign,” he said.

One bill that won’t make it to a committee of conference is HB 1582, which would have prevented New Hampshire from complying with the federal REAL ID act. The bill made it through the House and had the backing of Gov. John Lynch, but the Senate amended the bill that would have only required a legislative study committee to examine REAL ID. House leaders requested a committee of conference for HB 1582, but the Senate declined, killing the bill.