A CHILD'S PLACE

When in the course of human events, it becomes imperative for American CHILDREN to finally assume alongside adult citizens of this vibrant and ever-evolving democracy, the position to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle every human being, one more worthy than CHILDREN’S past and present standing as mere chattel under law, a decent respect for the opinions of humankind requires those who seek such improvement to declare the causes that so entitle CHILDREN within any society claiming to be free, democratic and civilized.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created first as CHILDREN; that CHILDREN are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; that governments serve no higher purpose than to secure these rights for CHILDREN alongside adults. Whenever any part of government becomes dismissive or destructive of these ends, it is the right of those who witness the everyday suffering of thousands of CHILDREN to insist upon the institution of new laws, new procedures and new attitudes throughout government and society to secure the safety and happiness of CHILDREN, who are our only possible future.

History indeed suggests that the entrenched systems and bureaucracies of government, which often operate in secrecy to determine the fate of afflicted CHILDREN, can not easily be changed. Experience has shown that children are in no position to advocate for themselves and adults often lack the knowledge and sense of moral outrage necessary to right these broken systems by abolishing the institutional forms and processes to which they are accustomed.
Let us recognize that most abuse and neglect of CHILDREN begins in the home, in those individual families that are unable or unwilling to nurture the CHILDREN they bring into the world, who instead become their innocent victims. A government of and for the people should encourage preventative education in CHILD development to support families and forestall these frequent tragedies. Instead our public institutions oftentimes compound individual cases of abuse and neglect by arriving late, after the fact and wielding only blunt instruments to effect change.

When the long train of wrongs done to those CHILDREN we grind painfully through the mis-shapen cogs and gears of our justice and welfare systems becomes evident and when CHILDREN are killed, maimed and scarred for life by ungodly governmental ineptness and repetitive official failures, it is the duty of every responsible adult who was ever a CHILD to throw down these broken tentacles of government, and to provide new guards for the future safety of our CHILDREN.

The patient suffering of abused and neglected CHILDREN historically had no voice to protest, but now a rising tide of public indignation at regular appalling revelations of the terrible experience meted out to innocent CHILDREN by a fundamentally broken and archaic system compels that caring public to demand henceforth that the official treatment of CHILDREN in harm’s way be worthy of this great nation.

The history of our nation is an unfortunate litany of repeated injuries and usurpations towards children, advertant and inadvertent; by the standards of much of the rest of the world our treatment of children should cause us shame. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world:
· Nearly two million American children reported as victims of abuse or neglect are corroborated each year. .
· Well over 1,000 American children die each year of abuse or neglect: more than three each day.
· A million American children are currently in foster homes, institutionalized or homeless.
· 8,000 American children are raped each week.
· Over half American children who appear in official hearings where their interests are at stake have no lawyer.
· Most official consideration of a child’s Best Interests in Abuse, Neglect and Dependency determinations takes place without the child being heard, without the necessary resources and without the trained, qualified investigation and deliberation that would best serve the child.
· The presumption of governmental secrecy, whether or not it is necessary to serve the child’s need for privacy and oftentimes even after the child’s death, frequently allows official misfeasance to continue unchecked by public awareness and protest.
· Unlike all adults, a child harmed by state decisions and actions has no right to seek redress or damages. As a result, agencies mandated to protect children are not required to protect them and face no legal consequences for their repetitive failures.
· Children are offered specific protections by the constitutions of over 80 sovereign nations, but not by that of the United States.
· Alongside Somalia, the United States is one of only two nations out of 193 that have failed to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of The Child.

In entering upon the great work before us, we anticipate no small amount of misconception, misrepresentation, and ridicule; but we shall use every instrumentality within our power to effect our object: putting CHILDREN first. We shall employ agents, circulate tracts, petition the State and National legislatures, and endeavor to enlist the pulpit and the press in our behalf. We trust that recognition of CHILDREN’S natural pre-eminence in society and of the disgraceful position to which they have in fact been relegated will lead to thoughtful reflection and thus public agitation for change by other adults of good will, embracing every part of the country.
For the support of this declaration of the inalienable prerogatives of all our CHILDREN, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

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Peter Samuelson is Founder and serving President of First Star (www.firststar.org) a 501(c)(3) charity tasked with addressing the appalling situation of abused and neglected children in our midst.