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THE STATE OF AMERICA'S CHILDREN YEARBOOK 1998 Five Questions All American Citizens Should Ask Ourselves and Our Political Leaders About National Priorities As a Democrat, as a Christian, as a southern Baptist, as someone who fundamentally believes in the words of the Bible ... I [do not] believe that God's response to the poor is to treat them as though they are the least priority, almost as though they are a nuisance to be dealt with.... With all due respect to the Christian Coalition, where does it say in the Scriptures that the character of God is to give more to those who have and less to those who have not? ... If there is one thing evident in the Scriptures, it is that God gives priority to the poor. U.S. Representative Glenn Poshard Democrat, Illinois J9th district Speech to the House of Representatives No one may claim the name Christian and be comfortable in the face of hunger, hopelessness, insecurity, and the injustice found in this country and around the world.... Every economic decision and institution must be judged in light of whether it pratects or undermines the dignity of the human person. National Conference of Catholic Bishops Pastoral Letter on the Economy The time has come for an all-out world war against poverty. The rich nations must use their vast resources of wealth to develop the underdeveloped, school the unschooled and feed the unfed. The well-off and the secure have too often become indifferent and oblivious to the poverty and deprivation in their midst. The poor in our countries have been shut out of our minds, and driven from the mainstream of our societies, because we have allowed them to become invisible. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation. No individual or nation can be great if it does not have a concern for "the least of these." Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? 1. Why is our nation continuing to spend $265 billion a year, $5.1 billion a week, $727 million a day, and $30 million an hour on "National Defense" in a post-Cold War era with no towering external enemies? Our military budget exceeds the total military expenditures of the 12 next-largest spenders-including Russia, France, Great Britain, Germany, and China-combined. Congress gave the Pentagon $9 billion more than it requested in 1996, while cutting $54 billion from child nutrition programs for poor and legal immigrant children and families. The military plans to purchase three new tactical fighter systems that will cost $355 billion-systems the U.S. General Accounting Office says we don't need and can't afford-at a time when millions of struggling parents left behind in xvi CHI L D R EN' S D E FEN S E FUN D
...... ..;I..;.;.N T ROD U C;;.",;.T..;I,.;O;;...;.,N;,.-. ...... the global economy need better-paying jobs and millions of children need health care, quality child care, education, and housing. As President Dwight Eisenhower reminded us in 1953, "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fIred signifies ... a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, and the hopes ofits children." • Every 14 hours we spend more on the military than we do annually on programs to prevent and treat child abuse. • Every 29 hours we spend more on the military than we do annually on summer jobs for unemployed youths. • Every six days we spend more on the military than we do annually on the Child Care and Development Block Grant for child care for low-income working parents. • Every six days we spend more on the military than we do annually on Head Start, which still serves only one in three eligible children. • Every 11 days we spend more on the military than we do annually on Title I compensatory education for disadvantaged children. It takes only a few nuclear weapons to blow up humankind. America spends tens ofbillions ofdollars to maintain a nuclear overkill "advantage" at a time when irresponsible leaders and gangsters seek access to inadequately secured nuclear weapon stockpiles and a cheap computer chip can accidentally launch a nuclear war. "Can't we do better than condone a world in which nuclear weapons are accepted as commonplace?" asks retired General George Lee Butler, former head ofthe Strategic Air Command. "The elimination of nuclear weapons," Butler states, "is called utopia by people who forget that for so many decades the end of the Cold War was considered utopia." As we near the close ofa 20th century marked by dazzling scientiflc and technological progress, but also the bloodiest century in history, we all need to reassess the meaning of power and of life. More than 109 million human beings lost their lives in wars during this century, and far more civilians than soldiers died due to military con- Key Fads About Poor Children 3 in 5 are White. 1 in 3 lives in suburban America. 1 in 3 lives in a family with married parents. 2 in 3 live in a working family. flicts. We must heed General Omar Bradley's warning on Armistice Day in 1948: We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. ... Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living. The way to win an atomic war is to make certain it never starts. And the way to make sure it never starts is to abolish the dangerous costly nuclear stockpiles which imprison humankind. 2. Why, with over 200 million guns in circulation already killing a child every hour and a half, does our country manufacture or import a new gun every eight seconds? American children under age 15 are 12 times more likely to die from gunfIre than children in 25 other industrialized nations combined. Virtually all violent youth crime is gun-
Page 2 and 3: About CDF he Children's Defense Fun
Page 4 and 5: Copyright © 1998 by Children's Def
Page 6 and 7: Acknowledgments Susanne Martinez, d
Page 8 and 9: THE STATE OF AMERICA'S CHILDREN YEA
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THE STATE OF AMERICA'S CHILDREN YEA
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L-__T.HE STATE OF AMERICA'S CHILDRE
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CHAPTER CHILD NUTRITION any America
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CHILD NUTRITION gram requirements,
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CHAPTER CHILDREN AND FAMILIES IN CR
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CHILDREN AND FAMILIES IN CRISIS pas
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CHILDREN AND FAMILIES IN CRISIS in
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CHILDREN A D FAMILIES IN CRISIS kin
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CHAPTER ADOLESCENT PREGNANCY fter r
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ADOLESCENT PREGNANCY 512,115 babies
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ADOLESCENT PREGNANCY sexual activit
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ADOLESCENT PREGNANCY ings. However,
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ADO L ESC EN T PRE G NAN C Y .... h
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106 CHI L D R EN' S D E FEN S E FUN
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THE STATE OF AMERICA'S CHILDRE YEAR
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THE STATE OF AMERICA'S HILDREN YEAR
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Selected Web Sites Listed below are
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