Lawyering the 'Indian Child Welfare Act'

This article describes how the statutory structure of child welfare laws enables lawyers and courts to exploit deep-seated stereotypes about American Indian people rooted in systemic racism to undermine the enforcement of the rights of Indian families and tribes. Even when Indian custodians and trib...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inMichigan law review Vol. 120; no. 8; pp. 1755 - 1798
Main Authors Fletcher, Matthew, Singel, Wenona
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Ann Arbor Michigan Law Review Association 01.06.2022
Subjects
Adoption
Attorneys
Child welfare
Civil rights
Constitutional law
Demographic aspects
Family law
Federal government
Indian claims
Indians of North America
Influence
Law and legislation
Laws, regulations and rules
Native American children
Native North Americans
Parents & parenting
Power
Remedies
Stereotype (Psychology)
Stereotypes
Systemic racism
Tribes
UNITED STATES
United States > US
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Summary:This article describes how the statutory structure of child welfare laws enables lawyers and courts to exploit deep-seated stereotypes about American Indian people rooted in systemic racism to undermine the enforcement of the rights of Indian families and tribes. Even when Indian custodians and tribes are able to protect their rights in court, their adversaries use those same advantages on appeal to attack the constitutional validity of the law. The primary goal of this article is to help expose those structural issues and the ethically troublesome practices of adoption attorneys as the most important 'Indian Child Welfare Act' case in history, 'Brackeen v Haaland', reaches the Supreme Court.
Bibliography:MICHIGAN LAW REVIEW, Vol. 120, No. 8, Jun 2022, 1755-1798
Informit, Melbourne (Vic)
ISSN:0026-2234
1939-8557
DOI:10.36644/mlr.120.8.lawyering