National Adoption Month, 1996

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Part VII

The President

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Proclamation 6947--National Adoption Month, 1996

Proclamation 6948--To Modify Provisions on Upland Cotton and for Other
Purposes

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Title 3--
The President

Proclamation 6947 of October 29, 1996

National Adoption Month, 1996

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

Thousands of American children have never known what it
is like to belong to a family--to grow up with the
comfort and security that most of us take for granted.
They are children whose parents, for a variety of
reasons, are unable or unwilling to care for them.
Instead, these children often find themselves drifting
from home to home in foster care. They live every day
without mothers or fathers to guide them, nurture them,
and tell them that they are special.

Adoption is a commonsense solution that places children
in permanent homes with parents who will offer them
love and security. National Adoption Month is a time
for all Americans to reflect on the rewards of joining
children who need families with adults who seek the
responsibilities and joys of parenthood. This month is
an opportunity to celebrate family, especially families
formed by adoptions.

Our Nation has no greater responsibility than to ensure
that every child has the chance to live up to his or
her God-given potential. We can help meet that
challenge by identifying a permanent, loving family for
every child waiting in the foster care system.

Among the approximately 86,000 children who will await
adoption within the next few years are tens of
thousands with special needs. Many of these, through no
fault of their own, wait years for adoption. Yet when
these children are accepted into loving family
environments, they can bring the same joy, affection,
and love to their adoptive families as other children
bring.

In recent years, we have made important strides in
encouraging parents to adopt. I have signed legislation
to help facilitate adoptions by prohibiting
discrimination based on race or ethnicity in placement
decisions, increasing the recruitment of adoptive
parents, and providing a tax credit to families who
adopt children.

Much remains to be done, however. As a Nation, we must
continue to work to remove obstacles to adoption, to
recruit new adoptive families, to offer financial
incentives for placements, and to provide support to
parents adopting children with special needs. Nothing
should stand in the way of providing every boy and girl
in America the permanent, loving home each of them
deserves. Children are, after all, our country's most
precious resource and our most important
responsibility.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, WILLIAM J. CLINTON, President of the
United States of America, by virtue of the authority
vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United
States, do hereby proclaim November 1996 as National
Adoption Month. I urge the people of the United States
to observe this month with appropriate activities and
programs and to participate in efforts to find
permanent homes for waiting children.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
twenty-ninth day of October, in the year of our Lord
nineteen hundred and ninety-six, and of the
Independence of the United States of America the two
hundred and twenty-first.