On Marriage, Motherhood and Moynihan

Compared to 20 years ago, today’s mothers of newborns are older, more educated, less often white, more often Hispanic — and less often married.

A record 41 percent of American births in 2008 were born to single mothers, according to a new study of census and other data released by the Pew Research Center in time for Mothers Day. That’s an increase from 28 percent in 1990.

Is marriage over? Not quite. But the report did find an increase in unmarried women in their childbearing years over the past two decades, and, judging by the numbers, the idea of marriage as a precursor to parenting in America appears to be suffering setbacks.

That does not bode well for the kids. Traditional marriage is better for kids emotionally, academically and economically, as President Barack Obama, who barely knew his own dad, wrote in “The Audacity of Hope,” his 2006 memoir. Children “living with single mothers are five times more likely to be poor than children in two-parent households,” he wrote. “And the evidence suggests that on average, children who live with their biological mother and father do better than those who live in stepfamilies or with cohabiting partners.”

Although the unmarried-mother share of births increased most sharply for whites and Hispanics, the Pew Study found the highest share among black women. That trend was forecast 45 years ago this past March in “The Negro Family: The Case for National Action,” a landmark report by a young White House appointee named Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

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The truth ain’t always pretty, but it is still the truth.