THE BABY BROKERS: The Marketing of White Babies in America

by Lynne McTaggart ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 25, 1980

When the biological mother places her unwanted child directly with adoptive parents (circumventing public agencies), doctors or lawyers often act as intermediaries--""private entrepreneurs, dealers, and middlemen who have turned placement into a deal."" But journalist McTaggart, prepared to condemn them, comes around to suggesting--on rather flimsy grounds--that they fill a need. (The real crooks, in her view, are the ones who take the money and fail to deliver the promised babies; and we meet a few, operating out of Mexico.) Mostly, she looks in--without comment--on parents, unwed mothers, and successful adoption attorneys around the country. We meet a New York couple who, despite an attorney's $6,000 fee, are thrilled when he phones them to fly to Miami and claim their son; and we also meet attorney Stanley Michelman, who ""revolutionized the industry"" by importing pregnant women from Europe (all expenses paid) to provide a supply of babies. Unseemly, perhaps; but not to McTaggart--when she visits him posing as pregnant and unwed, he offers her money and a job, while respectable adoption agencies offer no help at all (she didn't, apparently, try shelters for the unwed and unwanted). As for the adoptive parents who ante up (according to a sliding scale--Jewish babies are the scarcest, and priciest) and who don't qualify through regular channels, they are seen as the system's beneficiaries. And it's the whole system that, according to McTaggart, needs restructuring. Others, however, are likely to take a less indulgent view of the private-adoption practices she describes--in the book's favor, with unusual fullness.

Pub Date: Feb. 25, 1980

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Dial

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1980

Categories: NONFICTION