Texas’ Chief Justice: “When the State goes to court to take somebody’s children, it’s not opening up a collaborative therapy session.”

Texas Chief Justice Jimmy Blacklock

This is probably the first time I've ever agreed with Texas Chief Justice Jimmy Blacklock. There's a good chance it may never happen again.  But there are data to back up his words. 

Blacklock ended his State of the Judiciary Address with some remarkable comments about the new Texas laws curbing the power of the family police. And he called for limits on terminating children’s rights to their parents – a more accurate term than termination of parental rights. 

You can watch what he said here.   

Here’s the text of that portion of his remarks: 

Using the coercive power of the State to take children from their God-given parents—to destroy a family—should never be our first instinct. It should ALWAYS be our very last resort. I want to thank the Legislature for requiring DFPS to keep more families together. Senator Kolkhorst, Representative Dutton, and others have been leaders on this, and I urge you to continue those efforts this Session. 

One suggestion is to repeal what we call subsection (O)—it’s section 161.001(b)(1)(O) of the Family Code, and it allows a parent’s rights to be terminated forever if the parent fails to check every box on a long list of things the state wants them to do to get their child back. The thing is—there’s another provision that allows termination of rights if the parent endangers the child. So, the State only needs to use subsection (O) if it can’t prove that the parent has endangered the child. But if the State can’t prove that, then why on earth would we destroy that family? 

Termination of parental rights is the civil death penalty. When the State goes to court to take somebody’s children, it’s not opening up a collaborative therapy session. It’s initiating adversarial litigation of the highest stakes imaginable. We need to do more to ensure that desperate parents in these cases have vigorous representation, and we need to make sure the Family Code doesn’t stack the deck against the parent before the case starts. Repealing subsection (O) would be a good start. Representative Dutton has a bill that would do this, and I commend his bill to your consideration. 

As I said, his remarks are bolstered by data.  As KSAT-TV reported in this story and in this one, the latest state data show that in state fiscal year 2024 child abuse deaths in Texas continued to decline.  And reabuse of children left in their own homes remains lower than before the new laws were passed.

Texas tragedy is foster-care failure in microcosm

KABB-TV in San Antonio reported this week on the tragic death of 16-year-old Mia Morales who died in a car crash after running away from a makeshift foster care placement.  It’s remarkable how many tragic failings of Texas foster care – and the failed attempt to fix it with a McLawsuit – are illustrated by this one case. 

● Mia’s mother says she gave up the girl and her other children for adoption nine years ago because she thought they would be safe.  The mother was being abused by the children’s father. 

What if, instead of simply accepting surrender of the children, authorities had removed the abuser from the home, and helped the mother with whatever she needed to raise the children on their own?  

● The adoption failed – the adoptive parents gave up on the children and sent them back to foster care. 

We don’t know how often this happens – family policing agencies never like to ask questions to which they don’t want to know the answers.  But the available data are alarming.  It’s clear that often the “forever family” is anything but.  This much we do know: The adoptions helped Texas collect bounties of anywhere from $4,000 to $10,000 paid by the federal government under the so-called Adoption and Safe Families Act.  When the adoptions failed, Texas didn’t have to return any of the money.  In addition to all its other harms, ASFA creates an incentive for quick-and-dirty slipshod placements. 

● One reason the mother might have thought surrendering her children to foster care was the only option: She’d been in foster care herself.     

Yet, even after generations of failure, we still delude ourselves into thinking foster care is fixable. 

● The story ends with the obligatory quote from a lawyer involved in the McLawsuit against the Texas system brought by the group that calls itself “Children’s Rights.”  

But the McLawsuit, like so many other nearly identical suits brought by Children’s Rights, does nothing to fix these problems and may even make things worse. Children are in makeshift placements because too many are taken needlessly from their homes.  The McLawsuit diverts funds from what does work – providing the help families need so their children aren’t taken in the first place.  And the lawsuit complaint even calls for stricter enforcement of ASFA. 

The failure of the Children’s Rights McLawsuit approach is best summed up when the local lawyer working with them tells KABB “What these children need are trained caregivers.”  No. What these children need are exactly what Mia Morales needed – their own families.

NCCPR in Youth Today: Texas caseworkers give us a lesson in whose lives matter

Sixteen current and former employees of the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) have filed an amicus brief as part of a lawsuit trying to stop Gov. Greg Abbott from using the family police – a more accurate term than child protective services – to persecute transgender children.  This is the money quote: 

“Professionals at DFPS did not enter the child protection profession to remove children from loving homes with parents or guardians merely because they follow medical advice and a doctor’s care, only to place them in a foster care system that is riddled with actual abuse, sexual assault, and even sex trafficking,” [Emphasis added.] 

Among them, the 16 workers spent 129 years at DFPS.  Most were there for at least five years.  Some were frontline caseworkers, some were supervisors, at least two were managers. Five are still on the job. 

Yes, they did the right thing in coming forward.  Yes, it took courage for those who left their jobs.  But consider what these workers are confessing: They freely admit that day after day, year, after year, they took children from their parents and consigned them to “a foster care system that is riddled with actual abuse, sexual assault, and even sex trafficking.” ...

Read the full column in Youth Today