Shut Down Child Protection Services

http://www.wnd.com/2010/11/222957/

 

Phyllis Schlafly is a lawyer, conservative political analyst and author of 20 books. Her latest is "No Higher Power: Obama's War on Religious Freedom." She co-author with Suzanne Venker "The Flipside of Feminism" published by WND Books. Schlafly is founder and president of Eagle Forum.More ↓

 

When the liberals and the feminists, including Hillary Clinton, began saying the “village” should raise the child, most people recognized village as a metaphor for government. We’re now seeing how intrusive Big Government Nannyism really is.

Operating under various names, state agencies such as Child Protective Services, or CPS, have been assigned the task of protecting kids from abuse or neglect by any adults, especially by their own parents. A new study casts doubt on the value of CPS.

Child Protective Services, which rushes into action based on anonymous tips, investigated more than 3 million cases of suspected child abuse in 2007. Alleged to be at similar high risk for abuse, researchers examined the records of 595 children nationwide and tracked them from ages 4 to 8.

The researchers concluded that CPS’s intervention did little or nothing to improve the lives of the children, and there was no difference between children in the families CPS investigated and did not investigate. The social scientists looked at all the factors known to increase the risk for abuse or neglect: social support, family functioning, poverty, caregiver education and depressive symptoms, plus child anxiety, depression and aggressive behavior.

The Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act was passed by Congress in 1974, and about 45 states passed complementary state laws. Taxpayers’ money began to flow big-time to the bureaucrats.

Learn about the depths the secular culture goes to in corrupting your kids – read “The War on Children: How Pop Culture and Public Schools Put Our Kids at Risk”

The research results were reported in the October issue of the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine. The report was accompanied by an editorial entitled, “Child Protective Services has Outlived its Usefulness.” It argued that CPS should not be engaged in law enforcement. If it’s a crime, call the police; if it’s neglect, call a public health nurse; if it’s an unsuitable living situation, call the appropriate social services.

Unfortunately, the researchers did not look at the harm caused by CPS bureaucrats who arrive unannounced with the police, interfere with a functioning family, and often take the children away from their parents and turn them over to foster care. When Congress and state legislatures vote on taxpayer appropriations next year, CPS bureaucrats should be required to demonstrate whether any good outweighs the harm.

Two cases involving Child Protective Services are now before the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court has just agreed to take a case involving the interrogation of an elementary child at school by a CPS caseworker and a deputy sheriff about possible sexual abuse at home.

This is a Fourth Amendment case: Camreta and Alford v. Greene. Oregon investigators are appealing a lower court ruling that they violated a 9-year-old girl’s constitutional right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure when they interviewed her for two hours at school without a warrant, a court order, parental consent or exigent circumstances.

This case could have a significant impact nationwide. Unfortunately, some government agencies are more solicitous in guaranteeing constitutional due process to vicious criminals than to parents.

The other CPS case now before the Supreme Court – Los Angeles County v. Humphries – has already been briefed and argued. This case involves the constitutionality of the child abuse index, or list, maintained by Child Protective Services in California.

More than 800,000 people are now listed on California’s child abuse index. These listings are very hurtful to individuals, since employers consult the list before hiring employees to work with children.

CPS puts people on this list from agency reports that are based on anonymous tips and suspicion, not proof. It’s mighty easy for a malicious wife or ex-wife to allege child abuse as part of her game plan to get child custody or increased child support.

The issue in this case is the fact that there are no procedures, no standards and no criteria for a wrongly accused person to get his name off the child abusers index. The Supreme Court is reviewing the Ninth Circuit ruling that Craig Humphries (whom a court pronounced innocent of all charges) had a “nightmarish encounter” with the California system, and “There is no effective procedure for Humphries to challenge this listing.”

In 2006, Congress toyed with a plan to create a national child abuse registry. The plan was abandoned because of the unreliability of state lists and lack of due process.

The child abuse registry should not be confused with the sex offender registry, which lists only those who have been convicted of sex crimes. The child abuse registry puts men on the list who have never been proven guilty of anything or even charged with a crime – a punishment that is entirely contrary to our legal assumption of being innocent until proven guilty.

Humphries has been trying to clear his name for nine years. Congress should defund these abusive registries, and I hope the Supreme Court declares them unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court Ruled That There is a Presumption That A Fit Parent Acts in Their Child’s Best Interest Not CPS or Your State

Notice that the court ruled that CPS may not I repeat may not interfere in a child’s life when there is one fit parent in the househould. They can’t and do not have probably cause to enter your home with or without a warrant and take your children.

SECTION 1
THE SUPREME COURT RULED THAT THERE IS A PRESUMPTION
THAT A FIT PARENT ACTS IN THEIR CHILDREN’S BEST INTERESTS
NOT CHILD PROTECTION (CPS) OR YOUR STATE
The United States Supreme Court has stated: “There is a presumption that fit parents act in their children’s best interests, Parham v. J. R., 442 U. S. 584, 602; there is normally no reason or compelling interest for the State to inject itself into the private realm of the family to further question fit parents’ ability to make the best decisions regarding their children. Reno v. Flores, 507 U. S. 292, 304. The state may not interfere in child rearing decisions when a fit parent is available. Troxel v. Granville, 530 U.S. 57 (2000).
Consequently, the State of Connecticut or any state can not use the “best interest of the child” standard to substitute its judgment for a fit parent and parroting that term is “legally insufficient” to use in the court to force parents to follow some arbitrary standard, case plan or horse and pony show. The State cannot usurp a fit parent’s decision making related to parental spending for their children, i.e. child support without either a demonstration the parent is unfit or there is proven harm to the child. In other words, the state and Child Protective Services can not impose a standard of living dealing with the rearing
liberty interest. The 1st Amendment bars such action because the rearing of children and the best interest of children is often based on ones religious beliefs, i.e. the separation of church and state. By the state imposing any standard of living or the rearing of children, they are putting forth a religious standard by their actions i.e. how you act, what to feed the child, how to dress the child, whether or not to home school and so on. The courts and the state lack jurisdiction on what goes on in the house even though they disagree with the choices made by parents, the Plaintiffs term this “parental immunity.” It’s none of the state’s business on how you are to raise your children. In other words, they can not falsely accuse parents of abuse or neglect just because they disagree with the method of child rearing or the standard in which they live.
State Law provisions mandate that the State invade the family, through the judiciary, to examine, evaluate, determine and conclude the terms and nature of the interpersonal relationship, spousal roles, spousal conduct, parental decision making, parenting conduct, parental spending, economic standard of living, occupations, education, savings, assets, charitable contributions and most importantly the intimate emotional, psychological and physical details of the parties and family during their marriage granting the judiciary a broad range of discretion to apply a property stripping statute with a standard of equity. This would be an abuse of the judicial power and the judicial system to intrude into U.S. citizen’s lives and violate their privacy rights. It is not the state’s right or jurisdiction to examine the day to day decisions and choices of citizens and then sit there in judgment and then force parents to follow conflicting standards with threat of harm for noncompliance i.e. abduction of children.
The United States Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment contains a recognized Right to Privacy. This fundamental Right to Privacy encompasses the Privacy Protected Zone of Parenting. The Plaintiff asserts that DCF policy and Connecticut General Statutes impermissibly infringe the Federal Right to Privacy to the extent they mandate the parent to support his or her children beyond a standard to prevent harm to them. They substitute the State s judgment for the parent’s judgment as to the best interest of his or her children. The challenged statutes do not mandate a review to determine if demonstrable harm exists to the children in determining the amount of support that the parent must provide.
The State is not permitted and lacks jurisdiction to determine care and maintenance, i.e. spending, i.e. child discipline, decisions of a fit parent based on his or her income in an intact marriage other than to prevent harm to a child. There is no basis for the State to have a statute that mandates a fit divorced parent should support their child to a different standard, i.e. the standard of the best interests of a child. Furthermore, the State must not so mandate absent a demonstration that the choice of support provided by the parent has resulted in harm to his or her children.
The U.S. Supreme Court has mandated that the standard for the State to intrude in parenting decisions relating to grandparent visitation is no longer best interests of the child. Troxel v. Granville, 530 U.S. 57; 120 S.Ct. 2054 (2000). This court should recognize the changed standard of State intrusion in parenting should also apply to the context of parents care, control, and maintenance, i.e. spending, i.e. child discipline decisions, on behalf of his or her children.
In conclusion, unless CPS and the Attorney General’s Office can provide the requisite proof of parental unfitness, you’re State, CPS, the Attorney General’s Office and the Juvenile Courts can’t make on behalf of the parents or for the child unless the parent is adjudicated unfit. And as long as there is one fit parent, CPS and the Attorney General’s Office can not interfere or remove a single child.

 

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