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Kayla Gordon
Cas 138T
Ben Henderson
14 April 2016
Indian Child Welfare Act
A group of people that are often mistreated and forgotten in American history despite
their vital role have been granted some privileges to erase the pain that they have endured.
These privileges include land, schooling, healthcare, and even casinos in some parts of
America. In an attempt to right the wrongs of history one of these favors granted is to keep
Native American families together. In the past the American government would remove Native
American children from their homes in attempt to erase their culture or heritage that was deemed
backwards or primitive. However in 1978, President Jimmy Carter signed the Indian Child
Welfare Act to stop the separation of Native children from their families. This Act was to reunite
Native American children that were placed in foster care to reunite with their communities and
re-connect with their culture. Today this law is still being applied and even though it began with
good intentions, it is now greatly inconveniencing adoptive and foster families around America.
This essay will argue to revise the Indian Child Removal Act to take into consideration the
effects it has on stable foster families and the needs of Native American Tribes around the
country.
In recent news a 6 year old girl that is 1/64th Choctaw was removed from her foster
family that she had been with for four years because the government wants to return her to her
Native American roots. She will not be returned to her biological parents who put her up for

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adoption but her distant cousins in Utah. This is the governments attempt to keep Native
Familys together and to preserve a rich culture that they once tried to exterminate. Her foster
family who were in the process of trying to adopt her say that it is unfair because even though
they cannot provide the little girl with the background of her Choctaw culture, they can provide
her love and stability. A statement from the Choctaw Nation Stated, The Choctaw Nation
desires the best for this Choctaw child. The tribe's values of faith, family and culture are what
makes our tribal identity so important to us. Therefore we will continue to work to maintain these
values and work toward the long-term best interest of this child (CNN Wire).
In 1978 a federal law was passed by President Jimmy Carter in order to counteract the
rapid removal of Native American Children from their homes by the American Government. This
law was to restore the damage of removing of Native American children after placing 25 to 35
percent of all Indian children [were placed] in out-of-home care. Eighty-five percent of those
children were being placed in non-Indian homes or institutions (Armstrong), with the slogan
kill the Indian, save the child. With this background it is understandable why the law was
needed but now it is causing major issues in settled families that do not have the malicious intent
of brainwashing children. I would like to propose a more fair and thorough look into the
adoption process and the return of Native American Children. To avoid problems that may arise,
I would like to implement a form that would allow biological parents to fill out whether or not
they think their child has any Native American ancestry. This would allow social workers to act
quickly and acquire DNA tests that could test the childs ancestry. This would help to identify
native children before they are put up for adoption or into the care of non-Native families. It
would also create a choice for social workers, they could hold interviews for children of a
conscious age and families to find out what the best plan for the child is.

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The identification forms and the DNA tests would help to avoid a lot of the separation
issues that will arise from finding out a child is Native American 3+ years into them already
living with their adoptive family. Stability is vital for any childs upbringing and in the case of
the girl who 1/64th Choctaw she is old enough to remember her first family and understand the
trauma of being separated from them so quickly. In case of older children that find out about
their ancestry later on in life, it gives them a choice whether or not to stay or leave their nonNative family. This is the time where they can decide which culture they want to embrace. In a
specific case from 2001 two half-brothers were placed into foster care, the oldest five was white
and the younger four year old was Hispanic. The bonded with their foster parents immediately
and since their biological parents were nowhere to be found and no distant relatives were found,
they were on the fast track to adoption. This was until a paternal relative showed up to claim the
boys. Their foster parents were confident that they were too far into the adoption process to turn
over the boys, this was until the family member stated that the boys were 1/16th Native American.
The boys, as it turned out, are 1/16 Native American, which made them eligible for membership
in the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska, making them subject to ICWA, and gave the relative
(though non-Indian like ourselves and related to only one of the boys) placement preference over
us(Moore). The case was taken to the American Indian Unit at the L.A. County Department of
Children and Family Services, and there the boys were able to say that they had no connection
with their tribe and did not want to live with them either. The case was resolved when their
biological mother was brought forth and she preferred the boys to stay with their foster family.
The form and DNA tests that I would like to implement are affordable, at home DNA
tests cos under $100 and can identify 1000 ethnic groups. They are also less stressful than court
appearances, they make it easy to identify children with Native American heritage early on.

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Doing these two easy things will help social workers identify where is the best place for the child
to go. Giving forms to biological parents that have the option for them to state whether or not
their child has Native blood or if they suspect it, will give case workers the green light to move
ahead to DNA tests. The form can help hospital officials or social worker decide whether or not
to perform a DNA test on a child before placing them with a family, this will also avoid using
hear say from close relatives that come to claim a child that is far into the adoption process.
For foster or adoptive children and families they will not have to worry about being
separated, the DNA tests will give them peace of mind. Facilitating DNA tests to children
suspected of being Native American will stop them from being put into the care of non-native
families even before there is a risk of attachment. For an adoptive family their child being ripped
away from them because of their ethnicity is not a usual concern, they go through rigorous
screening to make sure they will be suitable an loving parents for any child that enter their home.
For Native tribes they have the option to take in a child before it is placed in a Non-Native
family and the opportunity to revive their culture. Nearly seven hundred Native American
children are being taken from their home each year, just in South Dakota alone. The future of
Native American tribes rest on these children, but they cannot continue to better the future of
their tribe if they are being placed in non-native homes and group homes. Native Americans see
what is happening as kidnapping and they know that states do benefit from taking away Native
American children even with the Child Removal Act in place. The state receives thousands of
dollars from the federal government for every child it takes from a family, and in some cases the
state gets even more money if the child is Native American(Sullivan). Tribal social workers
believe that America is making a living off of their children. If the child could be returned
without having to fight a foster or adoptive family it would benefit them greatly also.

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Native American children make up only 15% of the Native American population,
however they account for half of the population of children in foster care. In the past over 85%
of Native children were removed from their original families and placed in new families or in
boarding schools where their culture was suppressed. Now being able to find and identify Native
Children, Native American tribes feel like they have the right to take them back and preserve
their culture and ways. The Native American population has been in decline ever since America
was colonized and today with them only making up 2.9 million or about 0.9 percent of the US
population the effects are still striking (ncai.org). Native Americans argue that the reclaiming of
their children is for the betterment of the child and the adoptive or foster parents will eventually
recover. The Indian Child Removal Act gives them a say in what happens with their children.
This one privilege gives them the opportunity to continue a legacy and create a brighter future
for their culture. They support the law and Angela Smith, an attorney that specializes in cases
concerning Native American Children says that that law is vital to protect her clients, basic and
inherent right to their family and tribal nationThis is why I do what I do, for the sacred center
of our Nations, our children. I am ICWA, and I support ICWA (Israel).
The policies I would like to see enforced are for the welfare of the children involved in
these case. All in all it should be about their safety and dignity being upheld. The argument for
non-native adoptive families and Native tribes are equally compelling and understandable.
However, with the use of a simple form and DNA test, the majority of arguments could be
resolved. The children deserve to be in homes where there are cared for and loved regardless of
their families background. If a non-Native family is all the child has ever known and they are old
enough to identify their adoptive parents as their own they should not be taken away from that
family. But, if they do chose to go with their tribe they have that right also. The policy of a form

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and DNA test would help to avoid the difficulty and the stress of tearing a child away from all
they know, by giving the officials the knowledge to assign them the proper home right away.

Works Cited

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Armstrong, Richard. "Historical Perspective." Historical Perspective. The Idaho Department of

Health and Welfare, n.d. Web. 13 Apr. 2016.
<http://healthandwelfare.idaho.gov/Children/IndianChildWelfareAct/HistoricalPerspectiv
e/tabid/1363/Default.aspx>.
"Demographics." Demographics. W.K. Kellogs Foundation, 2010. Web. 14 Apr. 2016.
<http://www.ncai.org/about-tribes/demographics>.
Israel, Josh. "Why A Conservative Legal Organization Is Desperately Trying To Kill The Indian
Child Welfare Act." ThinkProgress RSS. ThinkProgress, 08 Apr. 2016. Web. 13 Apr.
2016. <http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2016/04/08/3754462/indian-child-welfare-actcase-goldwater/>.
Moore, Johnston. "The Misapplication of The Indian Child Welfare Act - The Chronicle of Social
Change." The Chronicle of Social Change. The Fortnight, 01 Apr. 2015. Web. 14 Apr.
2016. <https://chronicleofsocialchange.org/child-welfare-2/the-misapplication-of-theindian-child-welfare-act/10872>.
"Protests Unable to Stop Childs Removal from Family under Indian Child Welfare Act."
WGNTV. CNN Wire, 22 Mar. 2016. Web. 13 Apr. 2016.
<http://wgntv.com/2016/03/22/protests-unable-to-stop-childs-removal-from-familyunder-indian-child-welfare-act/>.
Sullivan, Laura. "Native Foster Care: Lost Children, Shattered Families." NPR. NPR, 25 Oct.
2011. Web. 14 Apr. 2016. <http://www.npr.org/2011/10/25/141672992/native-foster-carelost-children-shattered-families>.