Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Law
Beyond Family Law, Sarah Abramowicz
Beyond Family Law, Sarah Abramowicz
Law Faculty Research Publications
Family law has traditionally been treated as an exceptional field, a marginalized and special case in which the usual rules of the legal canon do not apply. This Article argues that the current challenge to family-law exceptionalism has been largely one way, to the detriment of a central concern of family law: the protection of children and of the parent-child relationship. Family-law scholars have focused primarily on whether and how to import the tools and insights of other areas of law into the zone of family relations, while largely overlooking the possibility that the tools and insights of family law …
Note: English Child Custody Law, 1660-1839: The Origins Of Judicial Intervention In Parental Custody, Sarah Abramowicz
Note: English Child Custody Law, 1660-1839: The Origins Of Judicial Intervention In Parental Custody, Sarah Abramowicz
Law Faculty Research Publications
Many legal historians see pre-1839 English child custody law as consisting of near-absolute paternal rights. These historians believe that the weakening of fathers' rights began with the 1839 Custody of Infants Act, which created certain maternal custody rights. Other historians have noted that paternal custody was qualified even before 1839 by the Court of Chancerys application of the doctrine of parens patriae. This Note tells a different story and argues that the origin of incursions into the so-called "empire of the father" was the 1660 Tenures Abolition Act, a statute that ironically seemed designed to strengthen fathers' rights. The …