When Democratic Congresswoman Pat Schroeder arrived in Washington in 1973 with two young children, she thought it would be only a year or so until Congress passed a federal child-care plan. Sixteen years later, Schroeder's children are grown, and the U.S. still lags far behind most other industrialized nations in national family policy. House Democrats have taken a big -- and expensive -- step toward catching up by defeating White House efforts to weaken legislation to create a national child-care program.
Once discrepancies in two slightly different plans approved by the House and a version passed earlier by the Senate have...