Women, Children, Love, and Marriage

by C. Gasquoine Hartley

And if you doubt the truth of this statement, listen to the judgment of the Committee on Child Adoption as to the disgraceful carelessness with which adoption is being carried on in this country;

“We believe that the absence of proper control over the ‘adoption’ of children over seven years of age and under that age unless payment is made, results in an undesirable traffic in child life with which no one can interfere, unless proceedings are taken against the adopting parent for cruelty or neglect; children may be handed from one person to another, with or without payment, advertised for disposal, and even sent out of the country without any record being kept. Intermediaries may accept children for ‘adoption’ and dispose of them as and when they choose. Homes and institutions for the reception of the children exist which are not subject to any inspection.” (Paragraph 61, page 10 of the Report.)

The italics in this passage are mine; will you try to think what these conditions, which you are permitting, mean? Think of them with your hearts, not with your heads! And if you have a child of your own, passionately dear to your life, try to realise the abominable position—the cruelty that can hardly be escaped, as if it were your child, who was thus being handed callously from one person to another, without protection, without any form of legal guardianship.

We talk much of the nation’s care for children. Would it not then seem a necessary step to have some just provision of our law to protect the helpless unwanted child, who at present belongs to nobody? Humanity, and even good sense answers, “Yes.” The Common Law of England has hitherto always said most emphatically, “No.” Except for a reference to adoptions which has managed to slip into a marginal note of a Finance Act, there is no recognition of adoption in our laws.

The right thing to do is the simple thing. We have on the one hand, these homeless children, whose numbers have become much larger in these last years and with the change and slackening in responsible conduct, while on the other hand, we have, an increased number of women who are childless and will never be able to marry. The problem, at its simplest, is this: What can be done to bring together the childless woman with a mother’s nature and the motherless child?

I am not forgetting the Institutions that are already in existence. There are two agencies for arranging adoption, as well as other religious and social societies, and many homes, from which children can be adopted. These agencies are doing admirable work, but they cannot do a tenth part of what ought to be done. And the very worst cases, in which the child most urgently needs protection, often cannot be reached at all. This problem is too big to be muddled through privately. It is the concern of the whole nation.

The first necessary step is to legalise adoption. Until that is done, nothing can be done.

At present as I have told you, the position is one of very great danger. The law grants the foster-parents no recognised legal control over the child. The mother, or her relatives, unless obviously immoral and unfit persons, may at any time claim back the child.