Out of Wedlock and Into Danger : Illegitimacy: If viewed as a medical condition, it would be one of the leading killers of children in America.

An enormous--and growing--number of American children suffer from a serious health threat inflicted on them by their parents. Bluntly put, their health is at risk because they have been born out of wedlock.

In some circles, it is fashionable to see illegitimacy merely as an “alternative life style,” as good as any other. From the standpoint of the children in question, this view is tragically wrongheaded. Illegitimacy, and the parental behavior that accompanies it, directly endangers the newborn and may even cost a baby its life.

In the past, by a fluke of our statistical system, the United States did not tabulate infant mortality rates by a mother’s marital status. Now, however, a pilot project at the National Center for Health Statistics is correcting this oversight. The initial results are chilling. Regardless of the race or age of the mother, infant mortality rates are consistently higher for illegitimate babies.

Illegitimacy even seems to vitiate the health advantage traditionally conferred by education. In an eight-state sample in 1982, for example, infant mortality was higher for illegitimate children of college-educated adult white women than for the babies of married white women who had dropped out of high school--or even grade school.

Rough calculations suggest that illegitimacy is now associated with “excess mortality” of about 3,000 to 4,000 infants each year. Indeed, if it were a medical condition rather than a social disorder, illegitimacy would be seen as one of the leading killers of children in America today.

Severely stigmatized only a generation ago, illegitimacy has become a characteristic feature of American family life. In 1989, if trends continue, more than 1 million children will be born out of wedlock--50% more than in 1980, nearly five times as many as in 1960. This year, every fourth baby in the United States will be born to an unmarried mother.

The stereotype of the unmarried mother is that she is probably black and probably a teen-ager. But with the explosion of illegitimacy over the last three decades, the stereotype no longer holds. In 1981, for the first time on record, more white babies than black babies were born out of wedlock. By 1987--only six years later--100,000 more white babies than black babies were born out of wedlock. As for teen-age mothers, they account for less than one-third of all illegitimate births these days. Black teen-agers now account for less than one-seventh of all illegitimate births--fewer, in fact, than for white women in their late 20s and 30s.

The poverty rate used to be a fairly good indicator of the health status of children. Today, the illegitimacy ratio may be a better one. In the 1980 Census, for example, the child poverty rate was significantly higher for Chinese Americans than for whites--yet the Chinese American infant mortality rate was less than half as high. The paradox is explained by illegitimacy. Though more likely to be born poor, Chinese American children were three times less likely to be born out of wedlock.

In medical terms, illegitimate babies are more likely to die in infancy because they are more likely to be born at dangerously low birth weights. In general, a child is currently about 20 times more likely to die in the first year of life if he or she weighs less than 5 1/2 pounds (2,500 grams) at birth. Illegitimate children make up a disproportionate share of America’s low-birth-weight babies. This is not a trick of averages. Black newborns are 40% more likely to be low birth weight if they are illegitimate; white babies, more than 60% more likely. No matter what a mother’s age or race, the odds of low birth weight are worse for illegitimate babies.

Why should this be? Quite simply because illegitimate babies are far more likely to be poorly cared for by their parents. Black babies, for example, are more than 2 1/2 times more likely to receive no prenatal care whatever if they are born out of wedlock; white illegitimates are five times as likely to suffer such neglect. These discrepancies, of course, speak to broader differences in parents’ attitudes toward, and treatment of, their children.

What can be done about this scourge? New social programs and anti-poverty initiatives are probably not the answer. Illegitimacy is not caused by a lack of income or education. Whatever their other merits, moreover, America’s anti-poverty programs have come to function as instruments for financing mass illegitimacy. In 1986, the most recent year for which such figures can be obtained, more than three-fifths of the children of America’s never-married mothers received support payments from Aid to Families with Dependent Children or other welfare programs.

Ultimately, the solution to this crisis--and crisis it is--does not lie in Washington. It lies in the hearts and consciences of America’s adults.