[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 174 (Tuesday, November 25, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S15926-S15927]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   NOVEMBER, NATIONAL ADOPTION MONTH

  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, the Senator from Pennsylvania was talking 
about marriage. I come to the floor to talk about families for just a 
moment, and I will be brief. The Senator from Delaware has been waiting 
patiently also.
  This is November. This is the month of Thanksgiving. Hopefully, most 
of us are a few days away from the opportunity and the privilege to go 
home and sit down with our families and have a Thanksgiving dinner of 
some proportion; most importantly, to be with our families. That is 
what this country is all about and certainly that is what Thanksgiving 
is all about.
  November is, in my opinion, another special month. For the last 
month, I have been wearing on my lapel--and I do not have it on today--
a little gold word that says ``adopt.'' November is National Adoption 
Month. I am a proud parent of three adopted children. I am going home 
to be with them and our grandchildren for Thanksgiving. We have three 
children and seven grandchildren now. My wife Suzanne and I are 
tremendously proud of that.
  I became a father through adoption. Well, this month of November is 
National Adoption Month. It is a time to celebrate special families, 
the families of more than 2 million children in America who are 
adopted, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In fact, it is estimated 
that more than half of the population of America has been personally 
touched by adoption, whether they are adopted or have adopted or have a 
close friend or family member who is adopted or has adopted. In other 
words, many of us have said adoption is a phenomenally viable option 
when it comes to forming a family.
  Just this past week, we added to those numbers. November 22, this 
last Saturday, was the fourth annual National Adoption Day. On that 
day, the courtrooms of the Nation, where volunteers helped, over 3,000 
children found permanent, loving homes and new parents through the 
adoption system of our country. Think what this Thanksgiving is going 
to be to those 3,000 children who will now sit down at a table to have 
Thanksgiving dinner with new parents who are offering them permanent 
love and stability in their life.

  While this is wonderful news, there are still far too many children 
waiting for permanent, safe, and loving homes. Our foster care system 
provides temporary care for more than 580,000 oftentimes abused and 
neglected children. Among those children, 126,000 of them are waiting 
for adoption. For anybody who reads this Record or might be watching at 
the moment, listen up. There are 126,000 kids in America who would love 
to have one of you as their parent, their mother or their father, who 
would love to have you offer them a permanent and loving home.
  Sadly, every year 25,000 children age out of foster care. What does 
that mean? They become 18 years of age. They leave the foster care 
system, never having known a permanent, caring, loving home. Foster 
parents are caring, but it is not permanent and the child knows that. 
So they graduate out. They are out on the street at 18 years of age. 
They do not have the stability of the family unit. Seventy-plus percent 
of them get in trouble. Seventy-plus percent of them just cannot make 
it because they do not have a mom or a dad to refer back to, to help 
them, to give them advice. They are on their own at age 18.
  I would not have wanted to be on my own at age 18. Now I might have 
thought I could have been. But how many times did I go home to mom and 
dad to ask for their advice, their help, or their counsel? Well, 
innumerable times.
  So I hope Americans will consider opening their homes and their 
hearts to children through adoption. As an adoptive father, I can say 
this experience has changed my life, and this Thanksgiving I will be 
reminded of all of that when I hug those seven grandbabies and try to 
share a little turkey with them.
  Last year, President Bush launched the first Federal adoption Website 
to help families connect while waiting children across America connect 
to them. The Web site is www.AdoptUSKids.org. Go online. Find out that 
you, too, can become an adoptive parent.
  Mary Landrieu, the Senator from Louisiana, and I have cochaired the 
adoption caucus on the Senate side for a good number of years. We have 
passed a lot of laws to make adoption easier, we have provided tax 
credits, we have created incentives, because we want Americans to go 
after those 126,000 children who are not yet in permanent, loving 
homes.
  We have also created the Congressional Coalition on Adoption. I have 
just stepped down as its chairman. Mary Landrieu has become its 
chairman. It is now a freestanding 501(c)(3)

[[Page S15927]]

institute. We have had tremendous success with people coming in to help 
us, to advance the cause of adoption. We hope Americans might look at 
us also because we are willing to help them break down the barriers so 
that they can build their family through adoption, if that is what they 
choose.
  Later this week, a lot of Americans, as I have said, will be sitting 
down at that Thanksgiving table. It is a moment to be thankful for so 
much, but it is a moment also to recognize that you could give a little 
more. If it is at that time in your life or at that moment when you and 
your spouse have decided you want a family, here is one way to do it. 
There are 126,000 children waiting for you to select them and bring 
them into your heart and your home for a loving, permanent relationship 
that in every way will be positive.
  So November is National Adoption Month. Choose adoption as an option. 
If I can be of help, call me, or go online and go to 
www.AdoptUSKids.org. You will have a happier Thanksgiving.

                          ____________________