Abstract
The Battered Child Syndrome (BCS) was followed by laws and policies intended to improve protections for maltreated children. Medical professionals were initially very reluctant to believe that parents might abuse their own child. The BCS provided irrefutable evidence that severe physical abuse of children could occur in the child’s own home, and established clear diagnostic criteria for evaluating a child suspected of being a victim of child abuse. Dr. Kempe and his colleagues acted purposefully to conduct research on the treatment and prevention of child abuse and to advocate practices and programs that would make it difficult to ignore child abuse in the future. Among the innovations resulting from the Kempe advocacy are multidisciplinary child protection teams, reporting laws, home visitation to prevent child abuse, guardians ad litem for abused children, termination of the parent–child legal relationship in severe maltreatment cases, and the international journal,Child Abuse & Neglect.
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- 1.
- 2.
Dr. Henry Silver’s son describes the friendship and environment of colleagues in which the “Battered-Child” was described (Silver et al. 2009).
- 3.
Dr. Kempe wrote that the first hospital-based child protection teams “came into being 25 years ago through the efforts of Betty Elmer, M.S.W. of the Pittsburgh Children’s Hospital; Helen Boardman, M.S.W., Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles; and C. Henry Kempe, M.D., of the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Colorado Medical Center in Denver” (Kempe 1978, p. xiii).
- 4.
From the legal perspective, “the Battered-Child Syndrome” provides evidence that is res ipsa loquitur, which is to say it provides information that “speaks for itself” (Estelle v. McGuire, 112 S. Ct. 475 (1991)).
- 5.
Chapter 2 of Hobbes et al. 2004covers many aspects of the history of child maltreatment to which there was no long-term response.
- 6.
SeeChap. 13, Gary Melton’s chapter in this volume.
- 7.
Brandt F. Steele, a psychiatrist and coauthor of the “Battered-Child Syndrome” remarked on a number of occasions that people seem more able to recognize and respond to an external enemy, than to the “enemy within us.”
- 8.
In observing this possibility, rather than diminish in any way the absolutely critical psychiatric and psychological work with human emotions, thought processes, hormonal, and in general, neurobiological aspects of human-to-human violence, this framework suggests that “behavioral transmission” of an important health condition is also possible.
- 9.
This paraphrases Dr. Kempe’s frequent declaration that “all children should have access to society.”
- 10.
The law was also referred to as the Schroeder-Mondale Act. Senator Mondale at that time was the senior U.S. Senator from Minnesota. Pat Schroeder was the Congresswoman from Denver, Colorado, and thus C. Henry Kempe was her “constituent.”
- 11.
The organization today has nearly 2,000 members, accredits child welfare law specialists under the aegis of the American Bar Association, and files amicus curiae briefs to the state courts of last resort and the U.S. Supreme Court.
- 12.
In the Interest of Carlota B., 408 S. E. 2d 365 (W. Va. 1991).
- 13.
The Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act of 1980, 42 U.S.C. §§621 U.S.C. et seq; 42 U.S.C. §§670 et seq.
Adoption and Safe Families Act, Public Law No. 105–89, as codified in scattered sections of 42 United States Code.
- 14.
- 15.
In 2003 in Canada, reports from professionals accounted for 79% of the 25,257 substantiated cases of physical abuse (Trocmé et al. 2005, p. 86).
- 16.
This failure to comply with policy-based reporting duties seemed particularly prominent in cases of sexual abuse, but the Minister appeared to indicate it had broader application (Fitzgerald 2011).
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Bross, D.C., Mathews, B. (2013). The Battered-Child Syndrome: Changes in the Law and Child Advocacy. In: Krugman, R., Korbin, J. (eds) C. Henry Kempe: A 50 Year Legacy to the Field of Child Abuse and Neglect. Child Maltreatment, vol 1. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4084-6_6
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