When a Mother Beats Her Children : Why coerced birth control is not the way to deal with child abuse

Norplant, the first major new contraceptive in three decades, won’t be on the market until next month. But already a judge in Tulare County is seeking to coerce its use as a condition of probation. The ruling is being challenged as unconstitutional. It is difficult to steer a proper course between the rights of the individual and the public good. In this case, the judge has steered off course.

First, the facts: Convicted felon Darlene Johnson 27, is the pregnant single mother of four children. She beats them. A belt and an extension cord were the weapons of choice. Two children, ages 4 and 6, have the scars and wounds on their backs, arms, necks and legs to prove it.

Three of them are in foster homes; the oldest lives with Johnson’s mother. Johnson is soon to be released from a one-year jail sentence. Under terms of a three-year probation, she must undergo mental health counseling and take parenting classes.

It is the other probation condition that stirs profound unease. Superior Court Judge Howard R. Broadman, known for unconventional sentencing, ordered the Norplant implantation. Johnson, who agreed initially, said later she did not understand what she agreed to.

The Norplant device consists of six thin rubber tubes that release a synthetic hormone to prevent pregnancy for up to five years. It must be surgically inserted beneath the skin of a woman’s arm.

Case law, and the state constitutional right to privacy, would seem to weigh against such unwanted intrusions unless there is a compelling state interest to do so. Broadman said his order was “reasonably related to the compelling state interest, public safety and rehabilitation.”

But forced birth control does not prevent child abuse. It cannot alter destructive behavior; behavior must change before child abuse can stop.

Because Johnson is poor and black, class and racial implications are unavoidable. While Judge Broadman denied charges of sexism, racism and elitism, the charges will always arise when a poor black woman is ordered by a court not to reproduce.

Nor is the impermanence of Norplant comforting. Technology may soon provide all sorts of other seductive pills and devices that could be used--temporarily--in misguided attempts to right or prevent a wrong.

Then maybe Norplant could be forcibly used on teen-agers who don’t always take proper care of their children. Or, a few leaps later, maybe there would be a pill to make young gang-bangers temporarily less violent. But when that “magic bullet” would wear off, the underlying cause of the problem would remain untreated. And once begun, where would these sorts of unacceptable intrusions end?

They should end right here.