Giving Up Baby: Safe Haven Laws, Motherhood, and Reproductive Justice

Laury Oaks - NYU Press

In this book, Laury Oaks discusses “Baby safe haven” laws in the United States and the attitudes towards women who use baby safe havens. These safe havens are specified locations where parents can anonymously and legally relinquish a newborn baby and they have been in use in the US since the 1990s. Oaks believes that these laws fail to address the real problem: that some women do not have the necessary support and economic means to care for their children. The safe haven laws, says the author, “promote narrow images of who deserves to be a mother and reflect restrictive views on how we should treat women experiencing unwanted pregnancy.”