Install
Life & Family blog
How Evangelical Voters Became Republican Voters Between 1976 and 1984Evangelicals split their votes in 1976 and voted Republican by 1984; here is the history of schools, Roe, the Moral Majority and Reagan that explains the shift.A church food pantry checklist, from IRS rules to dignity at the doorA grouped checklist for starting or fixing a church food pantry: tax status, insurance, food safety, sourcing, intake and serving everyone without strings.From Charitable Choice to the faith-based office, when churches got a seatHow a 1996 provision and a 2001 executive order told Washington it could not turn away a soup kitchen for having a steeple, and what critics on both sides say.Should the child credit pay families who don't work? The 2021 argumentThe best case for the 2021 child credit expansion, and the conservative answer about work, the EITC, the 1996 reform and a fair test for any family credit.The child tax credit from $400 to $2,000, told bill by billA dated timeline of the child tax credit, from a 1994 Republican promise to $2,000 in 2017, with refundable and nonrefundable credits explained.Two vetoes, one signature and the 1996 welfare law that put marriage in statuteHow a Republican Congress and a Democratic president ended AFDC in 1996, what the law did, and the fair criticisms from both left and right.Ten steps from a church pew to a licensed foster or adoptive homeA plain walk through becoming a foster or adoptive family in the order it happens, plus what a congregation can do for families who say yes.Who runs foster care, who pays for it and what the 1997 law changedFoster care is a state and county system under federal rules tied to money. Here is who sets what, what the 1980 and 1997 laws did, and where you can push.'Pro-life stops at birth' is the line to answer, so let's answer itThe charge says the pro-life movement abandons mothers and children after birth. Here is its strongest form, the record, and the honest gaps.Tocqueville Found America's Secret in the Barn Raising and the Town MeetingA French visitor said Americans solve problems by joining together, not by waiting for the state. His warning about the alternative has aged well.A home storage plan that keeps kids out and keeps you readyA step-by-step plan for storing firearms at home so children cannot get to them and you can still reach one fast, without waiting on a government mandate.What the 9-0 Fulton decision means for foster care and faith agenciesFulton v. City of Philadelphia was a unanimous win for a Catholic foster agency, and the narrow reasoning behind it matters as much as the result.The Hyde Amendment rider and the conscience laws that keep taxpayers outHow a spending rider from 1976 and a string of conscience laws settled, by the power of the purse, who pays for abortion and who must take part.Twelve pro-life dinner-table questions and honest answersTwelve questions family and friends actually ask about the pro-life position, answered in law, philosophy and policy, without contempt.Why abortion law differs from state to state, mechanism by mechanismThe post-Dobbs patchwork is not chaos. Six legal mechanisms explain it, and each one has a different group of people who can change it.What the Dobbs decision actually decided, step by step and in plain EnglishA plain-English walk through Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, from the Mississippi law to the vote, the test, the reasoning and what it left open.The pro-choice scholars who called Roe bad law long before DobbsLiberal scholars who liked the result of Roe v. Wade attacked its reasoning from 1973 on, which undercuts the claim that Dobbs was a political coup.The pro-life argument in four premises and where each one gets attackedThe pro-life case is a claim about equality, so here are four premises, the strongest replies to each, and the answers, argued from philosophy and law.The Family Is the Original Welfare State and the Cheapest OneFamilies raise children, care for the old and absorb shocks for free. Conservatives argue policy should support that work, not replace it.The IVF question that splits pro-life conservatives, argued fairlyTwo serious pro-life positions on IVF, stated at their strongest, and what Alabama's 2024 ruling and the legislature's reply tell us about embryo status in law.Why family policy should not punish the parent who stays homeChild-care subsidies and credits reward families who buy care and ignore families who give it. The fix is neutrality between the choices parents make.