"Separation of families of color at the border was far from the first time that our government has used the taking of children as a terrifying act of persecution. Our current foster care system is an extension of a deeply ingrained history of separating children from their parents based on claims that it would further the children’s “best interests.” Such claims rationalized separating Black families during slavery and Reconstruction and immigrant families at the end of the 19th century, when an estimated 200,000 children, primarily from immigrant Catholic families were put on so-called “orphan trains” often by Protestant “child savers.” Many of these falsely labeled “orphans”—most of their parents were living—ended up as indentured servants in the Midwest...
The family regulation system hurts many low-income white families as well, as other oppressive systems do. But to fully untangle the harmful practices of these systems, we must unpack their racist roots...”
By: Chris Gottlieb of TIME
