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A bill in the Texas Legislature would ban the words "retarded," "disabled" and "handicapped" from all state statutes and resolutions -- past and present.

Senate Bill 1395, by Sen. Judith Zaffirini (D-Laredo), would require what it calls more "person first respectful" language.

The ARC of Texas, an advocacy group representing people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, supports the bill because it says words like "retarded" are now used as slurs.

"The use of it has become so derogatory that it's turned the term into something that's hurtful and disrespectful," said Chris Rodriguez, director of chapter services.

The ARC itself has eliminated the word "retarded" from its name. For many years, the group called itself the Association for Retarded Citizens, but now calls itself the ARC.

"As that word became more and more derogatory it was required that we change and just simply become the ARC," Rodriguez said.

The bill would ban the use of eight terms in all state statutes and resolutions. They are: disabled, developmentally disabled, mentally disabled, mentally ill, mentally retarded, handicapped, cripple and crippled.

It would replace those terms with these: persons with disabilities, persons with developmental disabilities, persons with mental illness and persons with intellectual disabilities.

Mary Herbert, who has been in a wheelchair all her life as a result of cerebral palsy and other complications, says she is 100 percent behind the bill.

"I've heard them all my life, and no, it's not right," she said. "It's like they're trying to put a label on us, and to me, it's not right."

Herbert says many times, people look at her wheelchair and never look up to see the person in the chair.

"I'm a wheelchair, so what?" she said. "That's the way I look at it. I'm the one who has to deal with it. They don't. I really don't think people like me ought to be typecast."

We asked several tourists at the Capitol to give us their thoughts on the bill, and reaction was mixed. Here's some of what they said:

Bill Snyder: "I like the idea, but I don't think you should obviously use words like crippled or retarded to refer to people. I would say , though, I've been around Texas and have seen old monuments, 100 years old, and I think when you see those words it's interesting. It's part of the history and it makes you appreciate how far we've come in the past 100 years in the way we refer to other people. I wouldn't support changing really old monuments. Obviously today you would find a more artful way to put that."

Deni Dickson: "I think it's kind of silly. I think that in this day and age we should use good taste in how we refer to people, but at the same time, it's not the state's right to impose upon us what is good taste. I think in this day and age, political correctness is one of the silliest things we have. Everybody just use good taste and good manners and treat everybody the way you want to be treated, and I think if we all just use that golden rule we don't have to go around changing laws from 100 years ago....Everybody just have good taste and don't call anybody retarded or crippled or any other offensive word and I think we'll be fine."

Rose Denison: "I think it's great. I think saying the word retarded is not very nice. Saying disabled, or mentally disabled, is much better. Saying retarded is awful."

Kevin Landis: "I think (the bill) is probably a good thing to do, because it probably hurts the feelings of those families that are affected by that...It's about being polite, doing things right, but you don't need a law to say what you can and can't say."

Stacy: "It's like the book George Orwell's 1984. That's what comes to mind. "