U.S. Response to Domestic Violence a  History of Domestic Violence Programs

Call the police about a domestic violence situation in the 1960s, and the response may have been sympathetic but often was not. People were told to work it out or sleep it off. Call the police about a domestic violence situation in the first decade of the 21st century, and the response is completely different: there will probably be an arrest and the victim will be told of social service and legal options.

The response to domestic violence has changed drastically and positively in a single generation. The domestic violence programs were founded in the early 1970s as shelters for battered women; the first one was in England but they came to the U.S. very soon. At that time, these shelters were designed for women to stay a few days because at that time no one really knew the kinds of services that would be most helpful for victims of domestic violence and their children. Shelters were often a project of the women’s movement and as such were marginalized in the world of social services in a community.

Relations with the police in those days were not generally strong for a number of reasons. One is that domestic violence runs are really dangerous for police officers and they were frustrated with having to deal with the same families over and over. At that point, they typically did not see the shelter as an ally and a service that could prevent violence towards officers. Another is that as a part of the women’s movement, shelters seemed strange and somewhat threatening to mainstream law enforcement.

In the first twenty years of their existence, shelters developed in a number of ways. First off, as shelter personnel listened to the needs of the people using their services, domestic violence programs changed. Families could stay longer than just a few days and ultimately some larger programs created transitional housing where families could stay for a year or two. Domestic violence programs began also to create legal advocacy programs with personnel who would go to criminal court with victims and who would explain what was going to happen and the victim’s legal options. They also began to create programs for the many children who stayed in the shelters.

Domestic violence programs began to network with each other as more and more communities developed programs. In the state of Ohio, for example, the marriage license tax helps to pay for domestic violence programs in each county, which became incentive for each county to develop a program. Shelters networked to serve clients, particularly when a situation became dangerous enough that a client needed to get out of town. But they also began to create statewide organizations and eventually a national organization, the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. By working together in state and national organizations, domestic violence programs shared information and effective strategies for advocating for their clients with each other.

Within each community, the domestic violence program became a major player in the social service network. Getting into the network was a function of having survived in the community even while marginalized but also through gaining a reputation for being able to change relationships at least in some families. Children’s services workers often recognized that when women were in shelters, there was staff observing family relationships and that was helpful to their planning for potential victims of abuse and neglect.

Over time, relations with law enforcement changed, too. In one town, the police officers and court official began to notice that when the shelter legal advocate worked with a victim, the victim did not drop charges. They began to feel that their efforts in helping families with violence problems would actually lead to something positive instead of just going to the same old houses over and over again. In some communities, police response options began to be studied and it was discovered that when an arrest was made, police were less likely to be called back to the family’s home. This led to mandatory arrest policies in many cities. In order to implement mandatory arrest, police officers had to be trained in understanding the dynamics of domestic violence and this training was part of the change in their responses.

Another area where change is really evident is the church. During the 1960s it was not uncommon for women to be encouraged by the church to stay in violent relationships because “God hates divorce.” Over time, ministers and church people have gotten involved with domestic violence programs as volunteers and donors and have learned about what it is really like in a violent family. Now, many ministers and pastors advise victims to get out of violent relationships. Nowadays, shelters are a mainstream social service agency, along with alcohol and drug treatment programs, children’s services, and many other social services in a typical community.

Domestic violence programs may offer a wide range of services, from shelter to community-based support groups, long term housing, legal advocacy, advocacy in other areas of life, and even programs for the abusers. While average citizens may not know much about domestic violence programs in their community, they probably know that these programs exist—domestic violence programs and their values have become part of Americans’ consciousness.

Domestic violence programs have also become better funded and often they have moved from old rickety houses to spacious and professional-looking quarters, sometimes to buildings that were specifically designed to be shelters. In the past forty years we have moved from racist laws to having an African American President. But progress in Civil Rights has not been our only achievement. America’s response to domestic violence has moved from non-existent to very effective and helpful. While there are many social issues that remain a problem for our culture, our children at least know that both racism and family violence are wrong.