Why Ratify?

The CRC, incorporates the full range of human rights - civil, cultural, economic, political, and social - into one text that promotes and protects the well-being of the world's children and their families. Read more.

 US Ratification and implementation of the CRC:

• will help us to focus our energies and resources where our children need them the most,
• will give added help to children in exercising their rights in the United States & other countries
• will protect US parents’ rights to raise their children,
• will provide a way to assess comprehensively the law and policy on children’s rights and well-being in the US,
• will help Americans to have a much more effective voice in discussions with other governments and in international organizations to improve parents’ and children’s rights and well-being.
• will restore US leadership in human rights and improving conditions for children everywhere.
• will be in accordance with Federal and State Constitutions and statutes.

"By not ratifying the treaty we have everything to lose and nothing to gain." Charles MacCormack, Former President of the Save the Children in the CQ Global Researcher

The CRC changes children's lives!

• In East African refugee camps, orphans no longer have to depend on a friendly adult to get fed.
• In Senegal, Niger and Egypt village elders have been concvinced to postpone marriages for child brides so that they can get educated.
• In Minnesota, because the US has ratified the CRC's protocol against trafficking in children, teens who were forced into prostitition are put into rehabilitation rather than prison.

The reasons for ratification and implementation of the CRC are many and strong. There are many benefits to ratification, accompanied by a few, quite manageable responsibilities. There are many disadvantages for the United States and the world’s children if the US, South Sudan and Somalia are the only governments that have not yet ratified the CRC. The ratification process is straightforward and can be implemented once we have the political will. Even without ratification, it is in the interest of the US to articulate its implementation of the CRC’s standards for children’s rights.