In Indianapolis in 1917, Helen
Pearson intervened to set aside an adoption in which an irresponsible
husband had gotten rid of his wife and sick baby, but kept an older
child by violently coercing his wife into surrendering the older
child to him for adoption. All that was required was for Pearson
to provide the judge with the facts of the case. This experience
convinced Pearson that children and families desperately needed
safeguards and minimum
standards in adoption. Her study of the Indiana adoption law
was dedicated to eradicating “promiscuous” placements
and introducing “proper systematic supervision of this transaction
which is so serious to human lives.” Hers was a typical field
study. It equated research with reform.
Pearson found that the state of Indiana did not take adoption
regulation seriously and this placed children and adults at risk.
Investigations were not mandated. Probationary periods of six months
to one year were not required. Adoptions arranged through advertising
were not prohibited. And the state’s inheritance laws, which
allowed adoptees to inherit from both natural and adoptive parents,
were confusing. Bringing Indiana’s law into conformity with
the most progressive adoption laws in the country was urgently needed
in order to protect the state’s children.
Like other field studies,
this one offered county-by-county statistics
that clarified for the first time the numbers of adoptions taking
place and shed some light on who was involved and how they were
arranged. By analyzing all 636 adoptions finalized in the state
during 1923, Pearson revealed that almost half of all children were
placed privately, at very young ages, with strangers by unqualified
persons. These adoptions took place quickly, with little, if any,
exchange of information, and entirely lacked the investigatory and
supervisory oversight that trained social workers brought to the
adoption process. According to Pearson, most of these placements
were full of mistakes that would lead to failure and tragedy.
Pearson supplemented her quantitative data with cases she trusted
to illustrate that insufficient public regulation was responsible
for faulty adoptions. “Billy” was the second illegitimate
child of a feeble-minded and institutionalized mother, adopted by
a couple who knew nothing at all of his background. Three-month-old
“Dorothy” was easily adopted by a prostitute and raised
in a brothel. At fifteen, “Thelma’s” adoption
amounted to nothing more than labor exploitation. In none of these
cases had Indiana’s judges or courts objected.
“Can we not admit that the conditions brought out by this
study need attention by the state? If the life of one child or that
of one parent, natural or adoptive, is ruined through the state’s
lack of foresight, the matter is worthy of attention.”
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