ABSTRACT
Crystal ball gazing into the future of federal policy is a risky, albeit common, enterprise. A recounting of the past child care failures may reveal as much as the successes about the future of child care initiatives in the 1980s. An outline of the stated purposes and the substantive provisions of the bill provide a backdrop to understand its veto and the subsequent reformulation of child care legislation. The child development area offered the opportunity to give minority groups and other poor people more immediate control over an important segment of their lives. The central issue for the community change advocates was the criterion for prime sponsors of child development programs. The local councils would determine the child development needs and priorities of their constituent families and recommend funding of projects to meet those needs. Much has been said about the arguments and sentiment in opposition to federal support of child development programs generally and child care specifically.
