Resolution 115C, declaring that the Indian Child Welfare Act is constitutional, was easily approved by the ABA House of Delegates on Tuesday.
The Indian Child Welfare Act was passed in 1978 to address the fact that states remove Indian children from their parents at high rates. Because those children were not often placed with members of their own tribes, that high rate was hurting tribes’ ability to pass on their cultures to the next generation. The ICWA gives tribes a voice in custody decision-making and requires state child welfare agencies to place Indian children with extended family or other members of the same tribe when possible.