Reporter Steve Burton is writing an expose on the sale of babies for profit by fake maternity homes. While visiting kindly old Dr. John Gaines, Steve learns that of the two million babies born the previous year, some $50 million was made on their sale at $50 to $10,000 each. Much to Steve’s amazement, after the story is printed, it creates an outcry, and he finds himself assailed by a conglomeration of several charitable groups led by Dr. Wallace Rankin, the head of Mercy Shelter. Rather than withdraw the story, Steve quits his job. Determined to obtain the necessary evidence to support his accusations, Steve delves into the murder-suicide of a Mrs. Anderson and her adopted baby. Unable to return the congenitally unhealthy baby that she and her husband had adopted from the Rankin home, Mrs. Anderson threw herself and the infant in front of a rushing train. Following the Anderson lead, Steve enters Mercy Shelter when Rankin is absent, but the girls refuse to be interviewed. Meanwhile, Ruth Williams, who was recently widowed in an automobile accident, enters the shelter and, upon learning that she will be forced to give up her baby, goes into labor. Rankin lies to Ruth that her baby died in childbirth, then he arranges to sell her newborn to the wealthy Kingsley family. Ruth, freed from the home by her friend and fellow inmate Edith Drake, contacts Steve. With the help of Dr. Gaines, they determine that the footprints on her baby’s death certificate do not match those on the birth certificate. A study of the birth records of infants born in the same weeks as Ruth’s baby leads to the Kingsley home, where by a ruse, Steve and Gaines obtain a set of the baby’s footprints and find that they match those of Ruth’s child. Confronted with the evidence, Kingsley denounces Rankin, and his confession is overheard by the police. Mrs. Kingsley returns the girl to Ruth, after which Ruth and Steve leave, promising to let the Kingsleys come and visit. More on Wikipedia or Mubi
Watch Babies for Sale (1940)
