Law Commons^™

Creating And Maintaining Consistent Standards Regarding The Role Of Parental Substance Abuse At Shelter Care Hearings In Washington State, Emma Vanderweyst

Washington Law Review

When Child Protective Services (CPS) removes children from their home in Washington State, the State must hold a shelter care hearing within seventy-two hours to determine where the children should be placed while the investigation and dependency hearing proceed. RCW 13.34.065 requires the State to return a child to their parent’s care if there is a parent capable of caring for the child and there is no “serious threat of substantial harm” to the child. However, in July 2023, the Washington State Legislature will update RCW 13.34.065 to reflect a recently passed bill. This bill heightens the previous burden and …

Marital Disharmony: Examining The Adverse Spousal Testimonial Privilege And Its Impact In Washington State, Sabrina Suen

Washington Law Review

In Washington State, RCW 5.60.060(1) provides that “[a] spouse or domestic partner shall not be examined for or against his or her spouse or domestic partner, without the consent of the spouse or domestic partner.” This evidence rule, known as the adverse spousal testimonial privilege, allows a defendant to exclude witness testimony by their spouse under most circumstances. A product of common law tradition, this privilege stems from a time when the law treated women as chattel with no independent legal rights. Since Washington State codified the adverse spousal privilege, the United States Supreme Court amended the federal spousal testimonial …

Inheritance Crimes, David Horton, Reid Kress Weisbord

Washington Law Review

The civil justice system has long struggled to resolve disputes over end-of-life transfers. The two most common grounds for challenging the validity of a gift, will, or trust— mental incapacity and undue influence—are vague, hinge on the state of mind of a dead person, and allow factfinders to substitute their own norms and preferences for the donor’s intent. In addition, the slayer doctrine—which prohibits killers from inheriting from their victims—has generated decades of constitutional challenges.

But recently, these controversial rules have migrated into an area where the stakes are significantly higher: the criminal justice system. For example, states have criminalized …

The Trauma Of Trump's Family Separation And Child Detention Actions: A Children's Rights Perspective, Jonathan Todres, Daniela Villamizar Fink

Washington Law Review

In April 2018, the Trump Administration publicly announced a new zero-tolerance policy for illegal entries at the U.S. border. This action kicked off a wave of family separations that made headlines and drew criticism from around the globe. Despite resounding condemnation of these actions, the Trump Administration defended its family separation policy as a “tough deterrent.” At least 2,600 families were torn apart in the ensuing months. And subsequent reports—from both the government and others—have detailed widespread abuses of and substandard conditions for children held in detention centers. The consequences of these separations and the maltreatment of children in detention …

Incarcerated Parents And Child Welfare In Washington, Sayer Rippey

Washington Law Review

From 2006 to 2016, 32,000 incarcerated parents in the United States permanently lost their parental rights without ever being accused of child abuse.1 Of these, approximately 5,000 lost their parental rights solely because of their incarceration.2 This “family separation crisis”3 followed on the heels of the Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA), a federal law which directs states to initiate parental termination proceedings against parents when their children have been in foster care for fifteen of the last twenty-two months.4 Some states, including Washington, attempted to mitigate ASFA’s devastating impact on incarcerated parents by adding exceptions for incarceration.5 This Comment …

The Dangers Of Disclosure: How Hiv Laws Harm Domestic Violence Survivors, Courtney K. Cross

Washington Law Review

People living with HIV or AIDS must decide whether, how, and when to disclose their positive status. State laws play an outsized role in this highly personal calculus. Partner notification laws require that current and former sexual partners of individuals newly diagnosed with HIV be informed of their potential exposure to the disease. Meanwhile, people who fail to disclose their positive status prior to engaging in sexual acts—even acts that carry low to no risk of infection—can be prosecuted and incarcerated for exposing their partners to HIV. Although both partner notification laws and criminal HIV exposure laws were ostensibly created …

Access To Safety And Justice: Service Of Process In Domestic Violence Cases, Jane K. Stoever

Washington Law Review

Every day, in courthouses across America, numerous domestic violence protection order cases are dismissed for lack of personal service, even though law enforcement is tasked under federal law with effectuating service. Service of process presents substantial access to justice and access to safety issues for domestic violence survivors who seek legal protection, as nearly 40% of petitioners for civil protection orders are unable to achieve personal service on those against whom they seek protection. Research shows that the civil protection order remedy is the most effective legal means for intervening in and eliminating abuse, yet petitioners who fail to achieve …

The Marital Wealth Gap, Erez Aloni

Washington Law Review

Married couples are wealthier than people in all other family structures. The top 10% of wealth holders are, in great proportion, married. Even among the wealthiest households, married couples hold significantly more wealth than others. The Article identifies this phenomenon as the “Marital Wealth Gap,” and critiques the role of diverse legal mechanisms in creating and maintaining it. Marriage also contributes to the concentration of wealth because marriage patterns are increasingly assortative: wealth marries wealth. The law entrenches or even exacerbates these class-based marriage patterns by erecting structural barriers that hinder people from meeting across economic strata. How can the …

Dignity, Inequality, And Stereotypes, Luke A. Boso

Washington Law Review

In Obergefell v. Hodges, the Supreme Court held that same-sex marriage bans violate the Equal Protection Clause for two primary reasons. First, they subordinate; they send the message that lesbians and gays are inferior to heterosexuals. Second, they unequally deny lesbian and gay individuals the liberty to make fundamental decisions about identity and self. These two conjoined themes—anti-group subordination and pro-individual liberty—comprise the two pillars of “equal dignity” that anchor Obergefell’s holding. This Article proposes that these pillars also support the Court’s anti-stereotyping jurisprudence, and equal dignity is thus one important aspect of what the Equal Protection Clause …

Parental Abduction And The State Intervention Paradox, Jane K. Stoever

Washington Law Review

For most of America’s history, the common law deemed the family a “private sphere” into which the government did not enter. In recent decades, however, the state has increasingly regulated the family in overprotective and overly punitive ways. Many current state interventions in the family are misdirected, penalizing abuse victims and intervening in undesired ways that create harm while failing to respond to pleas for help. A prime area in which the state paradoxically remains laissez-faire concerns the phenomenon of parental abduction, a pervasive and devastating problem that has received scant attention due to the socio-legal focus on stranger danger. …

Not Too Separate Or Unequal: Marriage Penalty Relief After Obergefell, Mitchell L. Engler, Edward D. Stein

Washington Law Review

Joint tax returns have generated controversy for many years. Married couples with the same joint income pay the same tax under our current system regardless of the earnings distribution between the spouses. This approach primarily rests on the idea that married couples share resources and operate as a single economic unit. Critics typically challenge this assumption and lament how marriage might significantly change a couple’s taxes. Depending on their earnings breakdown, a couple’s taxes could be reduced (a marital bonus for uneven-earners) or increased (a marital penalty for even-earners). These possibilities exist because the joint brackets are typically larger–but not …

Not Too Separate Or Unequal: Marriage Penalty Relief After Obergefell, Mitchell L. Engler, Edward D. Stein

Washington Law Review

Joint tax returns have generated controversy for many years. Married couples with the same joint income pay the same tax under our current system regardless of the earnings distribution between the spouses. This approach primarily rests on the idea that married couples share resources and operate as a single economic unit. Critics typically challenge this assumption and lament how marriage might significantly change a couple’s taxes. Depending on their earnings breakdown, a couple’s taxes could be reduced (a marital bonus for uneven-earners) or increased (a marital penalty for even-earners). These possibilities exist because the joint brackets are typically larger–but not …

Divorce Equality, Allison Anna Tait

Washington Law Review

The battle for marriage equality has been spectacularly successful, producing great optimism about the transformation of marriage. The struggle to revolutionize the institution of marriage is, however, far from over. Next is the battle for divorce equality. With the initial wave of same-sex divorces starting to appear on court dockets, this Article addresses the distinctive property division problems that have begun to arise with same-sex divorce and that threaten, in the absence of rule reform, to both amplify and reinscribe problems with the conventional marital framework. Courts have failed to realize the cornerstone concept of equitable distribution—marriage as an economic …

Foreword: Compensated Surrogacy In The Age Of Windsor, Kellye Y. Testy

Washington Law Review

The authors in this timely symposium tackle the many and varied issues related to compensated surrogacy with sophisticated, diverse, and careful analysis. Moreover, they do so in the context of fast-paced legal and sociological change on issues of marriage and parenting, some of which was crystalized in the recent United States v. Windsor decision that spurred growing recognition of gay marriage and families across the nation.

Windsor, Surrogacy, And Race, Khiara M. Bridges

Washington Law Review

Scholars and activists interested in racial justice have long been opposed to surrogacy arrangements, wherein a couple commissions a woman to become pregnant, give birth to a baby, and surrender the baby to the couple to raise as its own. Their fear has been that surrogacy arrangements will magnify racial inequalities inasmuch as wealthy white people will look to poor women of color to carry and give birth to the white babies that the couples covet. However, perhaps critical thinkers about race should reconsider their contempt for surrogacy following the Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Windsor. …

The House Of Windsor: Accentuating The Heteronormativity In The Tax Incentives For Procreation, Anthony C. Infanti

Washington Law Review

Following the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Windsor, many seem to believe that the fight for marriage equality at the federal level is over and that any remaining work in this area is at the state level. Belying this conventional wisdom, this Article plumbs the gap between the promise of Windsor and the reality that heteronormativity has been one of the core building blocks of the federal tax system. Eradicating embedded heteronormativity will take far more than a single court decision (or even revenue ruling); it will take years of work uncovering the subtle ways in which …

The Future Of Compensated Surrogacy In Washington State: Anytime Soon?, Terry J. Price

Washington Law Review

Americans in the mid-1980s were shocked by the facts of the Baby M case. That case, a compensated surrogacy arrangement that publicly went very wrong, raised complicated issues that the country had not considered: whether a woman could contract to carry a pregnancy for another person without becoming the legal mother; whether she could be separated from the child at birth, even though it was her genetic offspring; and whether the contract could take precedence over a mother’s regret over giving up the child. As a result of that case, a number of states, including Washington, prohibited compensated surrogacy arrangements. …

Straddling The Columbia: A Constitutional Law Professor's Musings On Circumventing Washington State's Criminal Prohibition On Compensated Surrogacy, Peter Nicolas

Washington Law Review

In this Article, I recount—through both the prisms of an intended parent and a constitutional law scholar—my successful efforts to become a parent via compensated surrogacy and egg donation. Part I of this Article provides a narrative of my experience in becoming a parent via compensated surrogacy, and the various state and federal legal roadblocks and deterrents that I encountered along the way, including Washington State’s criminal prohibition on compensated surrogacy as well as federal guidelines issued by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration regarding the use of sperm by gay donors in the process of in vitro fertilization. Part …

Bearing Children, Bearing Risks: Feminist Leadership For Progressive Regulation Of Compensated Surrogacy In The United States, Sara L. Ainsworth

Washington Law Review

Compensated surrogacy—an arrangement in which a woman carries and gives birth to a child for someone else in exchange for money—intimately affects women. Yet, feminist law reformers have not led efforts to regulate this practice in the United States. Their absence is notable given the significant influence of feminist lawmaking in a host of other areas where women’s interests are at stake. This lack of feminist law reform leadership can be understood, however, in light of the complex issues that surrogacy raises—complexity that has long divided feminists. In response to efforts to pass surrogacy legislation in Washington State in 2010, …

Compensated Surrogacy, Martha A. Field

Washington Law Review

The question that was put to us is whether the widespread legalization of gay marriage, supported by the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Windsor, means that compensated surrogacy should be more broadly legalized. This essay takes the position that Windsor has little relevance to surrogacy, which will continue to be governed by state rather than federal law. States do, and will, follow a wide spectrum of policies on surrogacy, ranging from banning it and making it illegal to promoting it by enforcing surrogacy contracts as ordinary commercial transactions. The legalization of gay marriage need not affect states’ …

For A Feminist Considering Surrogacy, Is Compensation Really The Key Question?, Julie Shapiro

Washington Law Review

Feminists have long been engaged in the debates over surrogacy. During the past thirty years, thousands of women throughout the world have served as surrogate mothers. The experience of these women has been studied by academics in law and in the social sciences. It is apparent that if properly conducted, surrogacy can be a rewarding experience for women and hence should not be objectionable to feminists. Improperly conducted, however, surrogacy can be a form of exploitation. Compensation is not the distinguishing factor. In this essay I offer two changes to law that would improve the surrogate’s experience of surrogacy. First, …

Unequal Rights: The Fourteenth Amendment And De Facto Parentage, Adam K. Ake

Washington Law Review

Faced with an unprecedented number of children born into non-traditional family arrangements, courts across the country are struggling to preserve relationships between same-sex partners and their partners' biological children after those non-marital relationships end. This Comment argues that the Fourteenth Amendment limits the extent to which courts can intrude on the parental rights of a natural or adoptive parent in an attempt to provide remedies for non-parent partners, who are usually legal strangers to the children under applicable statutory schemes. U.S. Supreme Court jurisprudence implicitly recognizes hierarchical tiers of parental rights. Under this framework natural and adoptive parents have superior …

Making Mommies: The Washington State Court Of Appeals Exceeded Its Authority By Creating A Common Law Parentage Action In In Re Parentage Of L.B., Thomas G. Robinson-O'Neill

Washington Law Review

In In re Parentage of L.B., Division I of the Washington State Court of Appeals created a new common law cause of action that allows a same-sex de facto parent to be declared a legal parent. In the alternative, the court held that a de facto parent has a cause of action under Washington's nonparental visitation statute. This Note argues that the court exceeded its authority in creating a common law cause of action because the Uniform Parentage Act and the statutory scheme preempt the common law. Further, this Note argues that the ability of a de facto parent …

Grandma Got Run Over By The Supreme Court: Suggestions For A Constitutional Nonparental Visitation Statute After Troxel V. Granville, Eric B. Martin

Washington Law Review

Every state in the Union has a statute allowing for court-ordered child visitation by non-parents. Until the summer of 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court had never ruled on the constitutionality of such statutes. When the Court finally tackled Washington's statute in Troxel v. Granville, the Court left the most significant questions unanswered, while casting doubt on the validity of Washington's statute. Prior to Troxel, the Washington Supreme Court had held Washington's nonparental visitation statute facially unconstitutional, finding that the statute violated the Fourteenth Amendment rights of parents. After granting certiorari, the U.S. Supreme Court held Washington's statute unconstitutional …

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back: Vasquez V. Hawthorne Wrongfully Denied Washington's Meretricious Relationship Doctrine To Same-Sex Couples, Amanda J. Beane

Washington Law Review

Washington's property-division scheme for unmarried couples is among the most progressive in the nation. The scheme has evolved from a time when courts treated unmarried couples unfavorably and generally refused to divide their property equitably. The Washington Supreme Court took a step forward from this approach when it created the meretricious relationship doctrine. Under this doctrine, courts may equitably divide unmarried couples' property at the termination of their relationship if the relationship was stable, marital-like, and the parties cohabited knowing they were not lawfully married. Now, however, the Washington Court of Appeals has restricted the application of this doctrine to …

What Is A "Meretricious Relationship"?: An Analysis Of Cohabitant Property Rights Under Connell V. Francisco, Gavin M. Parr

Washington Law Review

In the 1995 case Connell v. Francisco, the Supreme Court of Washington adopted an innovative and groundbreaking rule to resolve the property rights of cohabitants upon separation. After Connell, upon termination of a "meretricious relationship," a trial court must perform a just and equitable distribution of the property acquired during the relationship that would have been community property had the parties been married. In adopting this rule, the supreme court sought to resolve property rights arising out of cohabitation in a predictable and equitable manner while maintaining the distinction between marriage and cohabitation. Unfortunately, the meretricious relationship fiction the …

Treating Prior Terminations Of Parental Rights As Grounds For Present Terminations, Kathleen Haggard

Washington Law Review

The federal Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 recognized that in certain egregious circumstances, states need not seek to reunify a family before terminating the rights of abusive and neglectful parents. Washington State responded by revising its termination of parental rights statute to treat parents' violent criminal convictions as sole grounds for terminating parental rights. This Comment argues that the Washington statute should be further amended to recognize that a termination of rights to a previous child may serve as grounds for terminating rights to a present child if the State finds the parent's continuing behavior puts the child …

What To Do When There's No "I Do": A Model For Answering Damages Under Promissory Estoppel, Neil G. Williams

Washington Law Review

Since its inception in the seventeenth century, the common-law action for breach of promise to marry has been the subject of recurrent legal debates. Beginning in the 1930s, some states began passing statutes that abolished the action altogether. Even so, today about half of American jurisdictions retain the breach-of-promise action in some form. This Article advocates a compromise that is not currently the law in any American jurisdiction: parties who breach promises to marry should be liable for damages, but only to the extent they have induced reliance by those to whom they were formerly engaged. Under this proposed model, …

The Indian Child Welfare Act: Guiding The Determination Of Good Cause To Depart From The Statutory Placement Preferences, Denise L. Stiffarm

Washington Law Review

Since 1978, custody proceedings involving Indian children have been subject to the provisions of the Indian Child Welfare Act. The substantive provisions of the Act set forth placement preferences for state courts to follow when determining adoptive, preadoptive, and foster care placement of Indian children. While the Act directs that the preferences are to be followed in the absence of good cause to the contrary, it does not include a corresponding definition of what constitutes good cause. The result under this vague standard has been a lack of uniformity in state court treatment of the "good cause" determination. This Comment …

Preventing Bidding Wars In Washington Adoptions: The Need For Statutory Reform After In Re Dependency Of G.C.B., Shannon E. Phillips

Washington Law Review

In In re Dependency of G.C.B., a Washington court of appeals held that an individual whose parental relationship was involuntarily terminated under the dependency statute lacks standing to later petition to adopt that same child. This Note argues that the Washington adoption statute would not necessarily prevent an equivocating parent who voluntarily relinquished her child from attempting to undo the finality of termination by later seeking to adopt. Nor does the statute effectively limit who can petition to adopt a child to individuals who have been chosen by the child's custodian or who have had the child placed with them. …