Lawmakers Try to Save Abandoned Newborns.

• Position: Brief Article

A young mother terrified and alone. A crying newborn left in a snowdrift. A helpless baby found on church steps.

These were the pictures drawn by Kentucky Senator Tom Buford when he told fellow lawmakers in March about abandoned babies and how he proposed to save them. He went on to remind them of a baby boy found in a garbage bin in February.

Like Buford, who introduced an abandoned babies bill, more and more lawmakers are looking for ways to encourage mothers in such a situation to leave their infants in a safe place. When the women abandon their babies, Buford said, government focuses on assigning blame, instead of saving a child's life.

Buford's bill would allow a woman to leave a newborn with emergency room personnel, firefighters or police without facing criminal charges.

A similar bill is under consideration in Colorado this session, spurred by the discovery of an infant left on the shelf of a grocery warehouse.

Under the proposal, parents who voluntarily leave a baby less than 45 days old with firefighters, at a police station or at the hospital could use this as an affirmative defense to prosecution. Texas passed such a law last year. Proponents of the measures also point out that four children's lives were saved when several Arkansas counties set up "unwanted baby"...