Law Protects Breast-Feeding Openly in N.Y.

It is a crime to try to prevent a mother from breast-feeding in public under a civil rights measure signed Wednesday that gives New York the toughest such law in the nation.

The law allows nursing in malls, restaurants and other public places, even if the breast and nipple are exposed. It imposes fines up to $5,000 or prison sentences up to five years for anyone who illegally prevents breast-feeding in public.

It gives mothers the strongest protection in the country, said Elizabeth Baldwin, a lawyer with La Leche League, a group that promotes breast-feeding.

“Now, if anyone bothers us, we can say, ‘Listen, we are protected by law here; you have no right to infringe on what’s happening between me and my child,’ ” said Liza Habiby, who says she was ordered out of a mall in suburban Albany last year for breast-feeding.

The New York law says: “The breast-feeding of a baby is an important and basic act of nature which must be encouraged in the interests of maternal and child health and family values.”

The surgeon general recommends breast-feeding during a baby’s first year. Studies show that it reduces chances of sudden death syndrome, childhood cancer, infectious disease and other potentially deadly problems. It also reduces a mother’s chance of developing breast and other cancers.

Museums in Houston and Ohio this year asked women to leave because they were nursing children. The Toledo Museum of Art in Ohio later apologized to the woman and now allows nursing in exhibit rooms if done discreetly. The Houston Museum of Natural Science offered no such apology.

New York in 1984 became the first state to protect nursing in public by amending its indecent exposure law to exempt breast-feeding, said Baldwin, a Miami lawyer. The new law gives women even more protection.

Florida last year passed a law that allows mothers to breast-feed in public without threat of being arrested for lewdness, but it does not impose penalties.

Cindy Story, the manager at Latham Circle Mall, said Habiby was asked to cover up but was not forced to leave. She said women always have been welcome to breast-feed at the mall, but were asked to cover up if other customers complained. Story said the mall would comply with the law, which takes effect June 17.