Marcia Zug
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Well, the name of the case is baby girl versus adoptive couple.
Associate Professor of Law at the University of South Carolina.
Matt and Melanie Capobianco, they are a couple who live down here in South Carolina.
She's pregnant and decides that she wants to give the baby up for adoption.
In session on the docket today, a young child ripped from the arms of the only parents she's ever known.
And turned over to the Native American biological father she has never met.
A man Veronica had never even met.
The 1978 Indian Child Welfare Act.
He's part of the Cherokee Nation.
Yeah, when she's... I mean, to her, they're complete strangers, and I can't imagine that she's not going to be terrified.
I mean, if you're someone who has no background in this, then you see a case like the baby Veronica case and you're like, whoa, where's this coming from?
I mean, what is a culture except, you know, the ideas and traditions that you pass on to your kids?
If you are hemorrhaging your children, then you're going to disappear.
Second preference would be someone else in the tribe.
And the third is any other American Indian.
And then after that, then the child could be placed with, you know, another family.
But by and large, most of us think that ICWA was probably the best federal Indian law ever passed.
It did the most to help Indian tribes respect tribal sovereignty and really fulfill the United States' trust relationship with American Indian people.
I mean, having given birth twice myself, the idea that anyone other than my husband would be in the room is kind of scary.
But it gives you some idea of how she felt about the Capobiancos.
Rather than pay a dime in child support.
And because of that fact, not only can this sort of man object, but he gets an automatic transfer of custody to him.
Because it would be detrimental to the adoption.
Every single federal Indian law is premised on giving some sort of special treatment to Indians.
What we have now is the court upholding the termination of his parental rights.
So if you recall, according to ICWA... When an Indian child is placed for adoption, her extended family members would be given first preference, right?
Other members of the Cherokee tribe would be next in line.
This means an Indian family from any of the 562 federally recognized tribes.
they are at the very top of the mandatory placement preferences, and the Capobiancos are at the very bottom.