It's easy to think violence against American Indian was a thing of the 1800s - but even in the 1970s, "1/3 of all Indian children had been removed from their families and placed in alternative, usually non-Indian, custodial care. In states like South Dakota, Indian children were placed in fostercare at a rate 16x non-Indian children." (Source: Dartmouth Prof. Bruce Duthu)
The Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) has been remarkably successful in ending state-sanctioned kidnappings - so why is a right-wing Arizona "think tank" trying to gut this critical law?
The Goldwater Institute is suing to exempt Indian children from ICWA who don't live on reservations, but virtually every tribe supports ICWA, the law's own author says they're wrong, and even Senator Goldwater himself voted for the bill.
If the Goldwater Institute has their way, this successful law will be decimated, tribes will lose their ability to govern their own affairs, and thousands of parents will risk the heartbreak of seeing their children legally kidnapped.
I am white, but this cause is dear to me. I was adopted at birth, and majored in Native American Studies. (Full disclosure: Duthu was my professor.) The Native American Rights Fund (NARF) is one of the most impressive rights groups in the country. When I saw they were fighting the Goldwater Institute, I knew I wanted to help, so I started this petition. Will you sign to pressure the Phoenix Institute into dropping their anti-child lawsuit immediately?
