Sixth-grader inspires legislation.(THE GOODNESS OF AMERICA)(Jack Davis)(Brief article)

In his fifth-grade social studies class, Jack Davis participated in a practice exercise to draft mock legislation. The lesson stayed with him.

When he was eating breakfast at a buffet in Chattanooga, Tennessee, over the summer, Jack became dismayed when he learned that any food left over had to be thrown out, because of the potential of the restaurant being sued if anyone became ill eating tainted leftovers.

"I thought it pretty disturbing to see pounds, pretty much, of food being thrown away every single day," Jack told ABC News.

Jack, who is now an 11-year-old sixth-grader at Ransom Everglades School in Coconut Grove, Florida, asked his father, Jeff Davis, who is an attorney, for help in putting together a bill to grant legal immunity to restaurants donating food to the poor and homeless. A friend of Jack's dad, Stephen Marino, who is also an attorney, presented Jack's idea during lunch with Florida state Representative Ari Porth. "I've never been contacted by someone so young about an idea for a bill," Porth told the ...