(CBS) – President Barack Obama signed a bill Monday promising health benefits for Marines and families exposed to contaminated water at a North Carolina Marine base.
The bill passed Congress last week with bipartisan support.
Health officials believed as many as 1,000,000 people may have been exposed to tainted groundwater at Camp Lejeune between 1957 and 1987.
Documents showed Marine leaders were slow to respond when tests in the early 1980s showed higher than normal levels of contaminates in ground water and the base, likely caused by leaking fuel tanks and an off-base dry cleaner.
The law also banned protesting within 300 feet of military funerals.
Numerous states have passed laws restricting protests at funerals after members of the Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas began protesting at the funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
