Connecticut Judge Charles Gill Thinks People Should Be Forced To Get A License To Have Children

Charles Gill, former Litchfield District Superior Court Judge

There are people in high positions of power, in the United States, that believe people should be forced to become "licensed" before they are allowed to have children.  One of these people is former judge for the Litchfield District Superior Court in Connecticut, Charles D. Gill.  Judge Gill wrote the foreword to a book called Licensing Parents, and says that this was the book that convinced him that parents should be licensed.  For an in-depth analysis on the extraordinary details and suggestions propagated in Licensing Parents, read the report A Critical Examination of the Book and Concept of "Licensing Parents".

The influence of Charles Gill in Connecticut law and politics was briefly described in an analysis titled "Parents Beware: The United Nations Looking To Give Children of Connecticut Special "Rights".  In the analysis it was discussed how Judge Gill was attempting to make United States law consistent with United Nations resolutions, more specifically The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC).  The UNCRC would drastically reduce the rights of parents over their children, by increasing government involvement into the lives of children, in the name of "protecting" them.  Judge Gill has been quoted as admitting that the UNCRC makes the state directly responsible for the child:

"The (UN) convention makes a total break from previous approaches to children's rights. Previous 'rights' were paternalistic, whereas the convention makes the state directly responsible to the child."

Gill wrote an article for the The School Superintendents Association (AASA) where he promoted the UNCRC, as well as discussing, among other things, a trip he took in 1972 to the Soviet Union as part of a "special education tour" with American and Soviet educators.  In the article Gill shows admiration for the way the Soviet Union viewed children as "national treasures", and bemoans his belief that Americans don't share the same view of their children.  Gill also displays an, in my opinion, radical view of the purpose of "public school leaders", suggesting that they should put "dangerous" knowledge into the minds of children to effect political change:

"Because of your experience, position, and leadership, you have the capacity to become "armed and dangerous" on behalf of our national treasure—our children. You are "armed" with knowledge and "dangerous" because you can put that knowledge to work in the political arena."

One excerpt from the article seemingly shows Gill's true feelings towards the parent/child relationship, implying that parents are detrimental in the development of children.  Writing about the need to "develop children", Gill says:

"An outstanding elementary school principal from Butte, Mont., Kate Stetzner, makes the point with perhaps more clarity. She subscribes to something she calls "the bathtub theory." Children come to school each day as empty bathtubs. Caring teachers and administrators dutifully fill that tub with nurturing, values, inspiration, and information, then the children go home ... and somebody pulls out the plug."

A Critical Examination of the Book and Concept of "Licensing Parents"

Jack Westman, author
of Licensing Parents

Licensing Parents is a book written by a professor of psychiatry named Jack Westman, which attempts to convince the reader that if the government required parents to be "licensed" before they were allowed to have children, it would result in fewer cases of child abuse and neglect.  Exploring and analyzing the concepts put forth in this book are important as there are people in positions of power that take this book, and concept, seriously.  One of those people is former judge for the Litchfield District Superior Court in Connecticut, Charles D. Gill.  Gill wrote the foreword to Licensing Parents, and says that this was the book that convinced him that parents should be licensed.  The influence of Judge Charles Gill in Connecticut law and politics was briefly explored in the article Parents Beware: The United Nations Looking To Give Children of Connecticut Special "Rights".  This influence of Judge Gill deserves a more in-depth critical analysis, but for the sake of brevity, we will just focus on the concepts presented in Licensing Parents by it's author, Jack Westman.

There is great deal of information presented in this nearly 300 page book, a lot of which is easy to agree with.  For example, it does not take a trained psychiatrist to see that there are problems in society, and that many of the functions that are supposedly set up to fix these problems, are not working.  Westman begins his book mentioning some of these issues such as "widespread crime", "the abduction of children", and an increase in suicide among teens.  It is not so much Westman's diagnosis of society's problems that deserve scrutiny, but his radical solutions to these problems.  Before exploring Westman's proposed solutions, though, it is important to understand what he believes to be the causes of societies ills.