Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior Deb Haaland praised the U.S. Supreme Court June 15 ruling to uphold the constitutionality of the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 that keeps Native American children with Native American families.
Haaland said the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 was intended to stop harmful policies that separated Native American children from their Tribes, according to a news release. She noted the Act would ensure the U.S. would "meet its legal and moral obligation to protect Indian children and families," leading to the protection of the Tribes into the future.
"Today’s decision is a welcome affirmation across Indian Country of what presidents and congressional majorities on both sides of the aisle have recognized for the past four decades," Haaland said in the release. "For nearly two centuries, federal policies promoted the forced removal of Indian children from their families and communities through boarding schools, foster care and adoption. Those policies were a targeted attack on the existence of Tribes, and they inflicted trauma on children, families and communities that people continue to feel today."
The Indian Child Welfare Act, passed in 1978, outlines standards for “the removal of Indian children from their families (extended families) and for the placement of such children in foster or adoptive homes which will reflect Indian culture.”
The Act reportedly gives Native American Tribes jurisdiction over custody proceedings that involve a child or youth who lives on a reservation or is a ward of the Tribal court, and “states that the objective of every Indian child and family service program is to prevent the breakup of Indian families.”
The Indian Child Welfare Act was put in place after the discovery that more than one third of Native children were taken from their homes and placed with families or institutions that had no connection to their Tribe or culture, according to a June 15 NPR report.
The Act sets preferences for where Native children will be placed when they are in foster care or adopted, NPR reported. Those include placement with the child’s extended family, with other members of the Tribe or with members of another Tribe.
The Associated Press reported the case in front of the U.S. Supreme Court came about when “three white families and Republican-led states claimed the law is based on race in violation of the equal protection clause and puts the interests of Tribes ahead of what’s best for the children.”
The lead plaintiffs in the case, a Fort Worth, Texas, coupled named Chad and Jennifer had adopted a Native American boy after fighting the Navajo Nation, which opposed it, according to Associated Press. The boy’s half-sister lived with the couple from infancy and is now 5 years old, and again, the Navajo Nation opposes the adoption.
The U.S. Supreme Court votes 7-2 to keep the Indian Child Welfare Act in place, with dissents by Justice Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, according to court documents.
“The issues are complicated. But the bottom line is that we reject all of petitioners’ challenges to the statute, some on the merits and others for lack of standing," Justice Amy Coney Barret said, according to the court documents.
