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The best thing a father can do for his children is to be their Dad. Unfortunately, America has become the land of the absent father.

On any given night, four out of every ten children in this country will be sleeping in a house where their father does not live. That is 10.5 million children who go to sleep without a father in their home.

And that man is sadly and bitterly missed.

A result is that father absence is the leading contributor to welfare dependency. A great majority of the families that need government assistance are single parent families.

Father absence is directly responsible for a poverty rate among children that has reached shocking numbers. Almost 75% of children living in single parent families will experience poverty before they turn 11, compared with 20% in two parent families.

Father absence contributes to crime and delinquency. Prison rolls show that a great majority of violent inmates were once little boys who grew up without the guidance and care of a father.

Our most crushing social problems -- crime, financial dependency, substance abuse, teen pregnancy -- would be dramatically reduced if fathers supported their children financially and emotionally.

Some people have come to think fathers are unimportant. But this myth of the superfluous father is strongly contradicted by research showing that Dads play a vital role in the lives of their children.

The male contribution to child rearing is unique and irreplaceable. Men often interact and parent differently than mothers. This is not to say that one parenting style is superior to the other, but that the two combine to give children the needed mix of love and control, nurturance and prodding, comfort and challenge.

It is in the process of socialization that fathers are truly indispensable. Research shows that children have greater difficulty learning to control their aggressive impulses in the absence of an involved father. Boys, especially, need to observe the one man they love and respect controlling himself, despite the presence of strong emotions.

Good fathers exemplify and teach that manhood is not simply about sleeping with a woman. Manhood is about courage, commitment and responsibility. They pass on the understanding that the fullest expression of manhood is to be found in responsible fatherhood, which requires men to work hard, find time for their children and nurture their marital relationships.

Many of the men are missing from their children's homes because they themselves had no role model. They grew up without a Dad themselves. There was no one to show them what it means to be a man and a father.

Human beings do few things that are truly lasting, that endure beyond several months or a few years. But raising children, teaching them to be good individuals, is the most lasting thing a man or woman can ever do.

Restoring fatherhood must be a national priority. Unless it is, legislative and other attempts to fix social ills will be little more than tinkering at the edges of a fraying social fabric.