By Dale Glading
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Over the past 33 years, I have met and ministered to hundreds of thousands of inmates across North America and Africa. Some of them readily admit their guilt and legitimately want help, while others refuse to own up to their criminal behavior (let alone its root cause, which is sin). The first group is well on the road to recovery but unfortunately, the second group is still trapped in a state of denial.
Helping a repentant prisoner who genuinely wants to change – but may not know how – often results in a saved soul and a redeemed life. However, offering similar assistance to an inmate who has yet to hit rock bottom and only wants help on his terms is usually a waste of time for both parties. And that, my friend, is the difference between helping someone… and enabling them.
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Which brings me to the United States of America, which is rapidly becoming a nation of enablers. Allow me to give you just one example today – and another tomorrow.
Since the 1960’s, our state and federal governments have been enabling immoral and counter-productive behavior. Specifically, they have been subsidizing out-of-wedlock births by awarding public assistance to impoverished young women for every new baby they bring into the world.
What began as a well-intentioned and temporary hand-up has devolved into a destructive and permanent hand-out, creating an entire underclass of Americans who are wholly dependent on the government for their very survival. That’s a classic example of enabling… and it is neither healthy nor helpful.
Ronald Reagan once said, “Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.” Applying the Gipper’s flawless logic, we get more injurious behavior in America because we subsidize it.
Now before you accuse me of being a moralist, inflicting my biblical worldview on others, allow me to reference Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and a liberal Senator from New York State. While serving as Undersecretary of Labor under Lyndon Johnson, Moynihan conducted an extensive study of poverty and its causes as part of LBJ’s “War on Poverty.”
His most important conclusion was this: out-of-wedlock birth is the leading predictor of future incarceration and lifelong poverty.
And yet, because we care so much about children (and rightfully so), we as a country continue to authorize payments to poverty-stricken single women for every new baby they deliver. After all, we reason, it isn’t the child’s fault. True! But isn’t it also true that – by financially rewarding single mothers for each new baby – we are also encouraging and enabling them to have more?
Please don’t give me the “well then, let’s abort them all” argument, because that is an intellectually dishonest strawman. Abortion was, is, and always will be the murder of an innocent child. Plus, government (i.e. taxpayers) covers the costs either way: providing C.H.I.P. and other welfare programs for babies that are born and paying blood money to Planned Parenthood for those who are tragically aborted. No matter how you look at it, we are subsidizing immoral and unhealthy behavior… and then feigning surprise when we get more of it.
There is no easy answer to this 60-year old problem, but here is a possible solution. Stop using government funds for abortions and stop paying for out-of-wedlock births after the first one. Everyone is entitled to one mistake, but not two or more.
Something tells me that, if young single women knew that Uncle Sam wasn’t going to foot the bill, they would self-regulate their own personal behavior and start acting more responsibly.
We also need to stop disincentivizing marriage. Nothing has contributed more to the breakdown of the family – especially minority ones – than financially penalizing poor married mothers and financially rewarding poor single ones. Instead of punishing a couple for marrying and living together under the same roof, how about providing financial incentives for them to raise their children together?
Terms like “baby mommas” and “baby daddies” should be a cause for concern, not for celebration.
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Dale Glading is an ordained minister and former N.J. Republican candidate for Congress.
