The Abraiding of the U.S. Social Father
Since the 1960s there has been a systematic peeling away of the U.S. social father from the mother-child(ren) dyad. Approximately 2,000,000 children per year are separated from an on-going social and biological father due to processes outside of the control of the “father.” In 1992, nearly 1,225,000 births or 20.1% of all births were to single parent mothers (U.S.
Bureau of the Census 1995) and 1,075,000 minor children were involved in a divorce (U.S. Bureau of the Census 1995). In up to 90% of the divorce cases, it is the mother who receives custody of the minor children (Sitarz 1990, Sack 1987). It should be noted that wives predominate as the petitioner in all divorce situations and further noted that when minor children are involved, the wife's tendency to petition for divorce increases and the husband's tendency to petition decreases (Mackey 1993, National Center for Health Statistics 1989). In a divorce situation with minor children, a social father had been present with the child for some duration. In single-parent births, he was not.To see if there were a relationship in the U.S. between rates of violent crime and rates of out-of-wedlock births, the two indices were analyzed, by state, across the 50 states.
Out-of-wedlock births, by state, were obtained form the Vital Statistics of the U.S. [U.S. Bureau of the Census (1992: 6)]. Rates of violent crime, by state, were obtained from the FBI (U.S. Bureau of the Census 1992: 181)].
Across the 50 states, violent crime rates were significantly related to the percentage of all births that were born to unwed mothers (rP =.655; p <.001; 2-tailed). As the percentage of out-of-wedlock births increased, so did rates of violent crime. Over 40% (rp 2 = (.655)2 =.429 = 42.9%) of the differences in violent crime rates can be attributed to differences in the levels of out-of-wedlock births. See Appendix I for the data by state. (Note that if the District of Columbia is added to the sample, the correlation increases to.825; p <.001; 2-tailed).
Thus, within the framework of this inquiry's parameters, there, indeed, is a linkage between violent crime within a community and the level of single parent births within that community.