Family Law Commons^™

Suspension Of Citizenship: Ethical Concerns In International Commercial Surrogacy And The Legal Possibility Of Stateless Children, Rachael Curtin

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Legal issues often exist in ethical gray areas. Advancements in reproductive technologies have increased family-building options for those that were previously unable to procreate. Similarly, globalization has increased family-placement options for children in the adoption context. However, when assisted reproductive technologies advance in a globalized world without regulation or international cooperation, international com- mercial surrogacy arrangements are governed by contractual systems that often protect the commissioning parties, rather than those who are most vulnerable and in need of protections. This Note examines how the current lack of international regulation and cooperation in the international commercial surrogacy context can leave children …

Pregnant People?, Jessica A. Clarke

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

In their article Unsexing Pregnancy, David Fontana and Naomi Schoenbaum undertake the important project of disentangling the social aspects of pregnancy from those that relate to a pregnant woman’s body. They argue that the law should stop treating the types of work either parent can do — such as purchasing a car seat, finding a pediatrician, or choosing a daycare — as exclusively the domain of the pregnant woman. The project’s primary aim is to undermine legal rules that assume a gendered division of labor in which men are breadwinners and women are caretakers. But Fontana and Schoenbaum argue their …

When Genealogy Matters: Intercountry Adoption, International Human Rights, And Global Neoliberalism, Barbara Stark

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Genealogy isn't what it used to be. Once genealogy was the route to "legitimacy," whether literally--a "fillius nullius," a child of no one, was illegitimate, a bastard--or more fancifully--a tastefully mounted family crest could be obtained for virtually any surname, for a price. Or genealogy referred to the painstaking search for roots, the recovery of a personal history, the excavation of a trajectory that would give meaning to the present. But we are all legitimate now. And DNA testing provides more information than anyone can process, including, for some, the refutation of cherished ancestral myths, a good chance of developing …

Adoption In The Progressive Era: Preserving, Creating, And Re-Creating Families, Chris Guthrie, Joanna L. Grossman

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

The history of adoption law and practice has received scant attention from legal scholars and historians. Most of what little scholarship there is focuses on the history of adoption to the mid-nineteenth century, when the first adoption statutes emerged in the United States. Although the enactment of these statutes has been hailed as "an historic moment in the history of Anglo-American family and society" and "the most far-reaching innovation of nineteenth-century custody law," few scholars have made an effort to document the actual operation of adoption law following the enactment of these landmark statutes. This article does just that. Drawing …

Renewing The Good Intentions Of Foster Care: Enforcement Of The Adoption Assistance And Child Welfare Act Of 1980 And The Substantive Due Process Right To Safety, Cristina C.-Y. Chou

Vanderbilt Law Review

Foster care. There are probably no two words in the English language that convey more of a sense of good intentions gone bad. Children enter foster care when their own parents fail them. Then they begin a state-sponsored journey through an over- land railroad of foster homes, some run by adults who truly want to help, and others run by scoundrels.'

The purpose of foster care is to provide a temporary safe haven for children whose parents are unable to care for them. Unfortunately, however, the foster care system frequently fails to provide children with stable, secure care, and fails …

Relatives By Blood, Adoption, And Association: Who Should Get What And Why, Jan E. Rein

Vanderbilt Law Review

This Article explores the questions that courts and legislatures must address in order to integrate the social phenomenon of adoption into our succession laws, monitors the progress that has and has not been made in dealing with these questions, and proposes a comprehensive approach to the treatment of adoptees in matters of succession. Specifically, part I introduces the traditional approach to relationship by adoption, while part HI compares the past and present goals of adoption. Part IV discusses the legal status of adoptees in the context of intestate succession. This discussion explores past and present trends and examines the special …

Domestic Relations -- 1963 Tennessee Survey, T. A. Smedley

Vanderbilt Law Review

During 1963, the Tennessee Supreme and Appellate Courts faced a wide variety of problems in the domestic relations field, but handed down no decisions of outstanding significance. The legislature made several minor revisions in relevant statutes, one of which may prove to be a rather important change in this state's divorce law.

Domestic Relations -- 1961 Tennessee Survey, William J. Harbison

Vanderbilt Law Review

In the case of In re Van Huss' Petition' the Tennessee Supreme Court denied an adoption under a literal interpretation of the residence requirements inserted into the adoption statutes in 1959. Under the 1959 statutes, although the petitioners in adoption proceedings were not required to make Tennessee their legal residence, they were required to "have lived, maintained a home and been physically present in Tennessee, or on federal territory within the boundaries of Tennessee for one (1) year next preceding the filing of the petition .... -

In the Van Huss case the petitioning husband met all of the other …

Domestic Relations -- 1960 Tennessee Survey, William J. Harbison

Vanderbilt Law Review

Domestic Relations--1960 Tennessee Survey

I. Adoption of Children

II. Persons in Loco Parentis

III. Divorce, Alimony and Counsel Fees

1. Venue

2. Jurisdiction

3. Cancellation of Decree

4. Alimony and Counsel Fees

(a) Discretion To Deny Alimony

(b) In Solido--In Futuro

(c) Duty To Pay Counsel Fees

(d) Court Alteration of Support Agreement

(e) Attachment of Property-Non-Residents

5. Jointly-owned Property

IV. Family Immunity in Tort

V. Tenancy by Tenancy by the Entireties

Domestic Relations--1959 Tennessee Survey, William J. Harbison

Vanderbilt Law Review

In the case of In re Matthews, the supreme court once more was called upon to construe the adoption statutes and to determine the relationship between the juvenile court and a court in which adoption proceedings are pending. In this same case, the court had earlier held that jurisdiction of juvenile courts to declare children abandoned is not exclusive and that in adoption proceedings a chancery court may determine whether there has been an abandonment of the child proposed to be adopted. The supreme court had remanded the case to the chancery court. In that court, the Department of Public …

Domestic Relations -- 1958 Tennessee Survey, William J. Harbison

Vanderbilt Law Review

Three cases during the survey period dealt directly or indirectly with the subject of adoptions.

In two cases which were discussed in the 1957 survey,' petitions for the adoption of two children were denied because of domestic difficulties in the home of the petitioning parents. The children were ordered to be placed in custody of the State Welfare Department. The foster mother, however, did not comply with this order promptly and was adjudged in contempt by the trial court where her petitions had been filed. The supreme court affirmed the contempt decree in a recently reported case.