I know Indiana has long been protective of its funeral industry, but I wonder what the back story is to this. Rep. Hamm has introduced HB 1122 which would make it a deceptive consumer act for a seller or supplier to remove, cover, alter, or make unreadable a country of origin marking on the casket or mark the casket as originating from a country other than the true country of origin of the casket. If no country of origin is marked on the casket, the supplier or seller of the casket is required to mark the casket with the English name of the country of origin. Interestingly, if I’m parsing the legislation correctly, it appears that if the casket is already marked with the country of origin in a foreign language, the supplier is not then required to mark it with the English name of the country.
I think that Hillenbrand is one of the largest casket makers in the US, and is headquartered in the Hoosier State. Seems like some dubiously effective protectionism. “Ma’am, you don’t want poor Elmer buried in a Venezuelan casket, do you? He fought for our country in WWII and deserves to be buried in the best the USA can offer.”
Here is Hamm’s website:
http://www.in.gov/legislative/house_republicans/homepages/r56/bio.html
It states he is the owner of a two casket companies.
There is NOTHING like a state representative who has (obviously) gone to the capital to take care of “bidness” (his own!). Still, I’m sure that he is a singular example of such blatant advancement of self-interest. ;)
My mother-in-law was buried in a Hillenbrand casket, and the thing that struck me the oddest is that it came with a 10-year warranty. Does it really matter how long a casket lasts once it’s dumped into the ground? I wonder if I can demand someone dig up the casket in year nine, just to see if the guarantee will still hold.