A Parental Presence Prevents Delinquency : Child Care: A mother or father best develops a child’s conscience. Society should subsidize a program to keep one parent in the home.

I’m going to stick my neck out as I did in my early days as a chief of police during the 1970s. Addressing the Los Angeles Breakfast Club, I made a statement that children need the mother at home during the first six or seven years of a child’s life. Nothing else--no one else--can do the job of civilizing an infant into a thinking child, a human being with a feeling of compassion for others.

As we begin the 1990s, I still believe that. One of our most serious social problems is juvenile crime and juvenile crime matures into adult crime.

The Delinquency Control Institute of USC taught me that all studies make clear the problem: Children from broken homes, children without parents to guide their destiny, tend more toward criminality than children who have at least one parent present in their early years.

I’m convinced that more than half the approximately 100,000 inmates locked up by the state of California--not even counting those locked up in local county facilities--are people who never developed a feeling of responsibility for their conduct, for the way their behavior affected fellow human beings. Many gang killings are performed by people who don’t have a conscience.

We used to call such people psychopathic personalities; now we call them sociopaths. By whatever name, they failed to develop consciences during their first seven years. If a conscience isn’t developed in childhood, it won’t be developed later. Fact.

The rearing of children during preschool years is the most important foundation for the advancement of a more civilized, safer, society.

When I criticized mothers for not being home to raise their children, there was a huge outcry--mainly from the liberal community--denouncing my comment.

Nearly two decades--and violent crime increases--later, I have not changed my thinking. As a civilization we have to consider the kinds of legislative action that will reward a family where one parent, preferably the mother, stays home during the years before a child enters regular schooling, nurturing that child with all the cultural values and understanding that mother--or father--commands.

Parenthood is thrust on too many people too soon, at an age before the new parent has thought through this exceptionally important new role. Parenthood is thrust on people before many of them really understand the importance of discipline, the necessity of love, affection and security so necessary to developing a child as a caring, thinking human being.

A bill I wrote was passed by the Legislature in 1984 but vetoed by the governor; it was a modest attempt to have each school district develop a program of parental training for high school students. Those are the young people who, in a short period of time, are going to be mothers or fathers. There is much to teach young people who are going to be parents.

I still believe that legislation providing parent-education in high school is one element to help children and adults lead better lives.

I would now go further and propose that both federal and state governments consider taking some funds, especially if we become a more peaceful world, to provide funding for a family where one parent stays at home to raise the children, thereby allowing us to become a more peaceful community. The funding would be in the form of federal and state grants, to encourage one parent to stay home during the early years of a child’s life. In today’s society, most mothers decide--from need or desire--to work and farm their infants out.

I understand the economic motivations for two-income families. There are so many wants: bigger home, nicer possessions and--in some cases--just a determined desire to at last make financial ends meet. Yet when you look at the cost to the family, and society, of having a mother go offto work when there are still babies in the household, the net profit is often illusory.

Having a mother on the job, outside the home, increases family expenses. One additional car, or bus fare. A larger clothing bill. Meals outside the home. And perhaps additional medical bills. Legislation cannot match the income a parent could earn if that parent went to work, but government can provide a portion of compensatory income, to make staying at home a benefit for the family and the community. Such a program would not have earnings or wealth tests as connected conditions. It would apply equally, regardless of current income.

Children produced by families of different economic levels have exactly the same needs from adults: love, discipline, morals and ethics taught in the home. Once that training is complete, then a child is prepared for adulthood, for the serious consideration of how personal behavior impacts other human beings. I believe parental presence would do wonders in reducing the number of criminals we produce in our society.

My proposal is not connected to--nor would it replace--the present Aid to Families With Dependent Children program. I have always supported, without reservation, the California AFDC program, probably the most generous in the nation. Yet it does not provide luxury by any means, only a certain amount of subsistence, perhaps the minimum a civilized society should offer for those people less fortunate.