Legitimate Families And Equal Protection, Katharine K. Baker
Dec 2014
Legitimate Families And Equal Protection, Katharine K. Baker
Katharine K. Baker
Abstract: This Article questions whether and why it should be unconstitutional to treat legitimate and illegitimate children differently. It argues that legitimacy doctrine is rooted in a biological essentialism completely at odds with contemporary efforts to expand legal recognition of nontraditional parenting practices including same-sex parenting, single parenthood by choice, surrogacy, and sperm donation. The routine invocation of legitimacy doctrine by advocates purporting to help nontraditional families is thus at best ironic and at worst dangerous. Analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court’s legitimacy cases reveals that liberal Justices, in trying to dismantle marriage—a legal construct—as the arbiter of legitimate parenthood, …
Homogenous Rules For Heterogeneous Families: The Standardization Of Family Law When There Is No Standard Family, Katharine K. Baker
Dec 2011
Homogenous Rules For Heterogeneous Families: The Standardization Of Family Law When There Is No Standard Family, Katharine K. Baker
Katharine K. Baker
The article explores the ironies involved in the contemporary enforcement of family obligations. As forms of intimate partnership and parenthood become ever more varied, the law of family obligation - child support, property division and alimony - has become increasingly routine and formulaic. As scholars increasingly call for more attention to the varied ways in which different individuals and communities structure their care networks and their intimate lives, the law of family obligation has become less, not more attentive to context. This piece explains how the law’s rejection of context is an understandable reaction to the growing diversity of family …
The Stories Of Marriage, Katharine K. Baker
Dec 2009
The Stories Of Marriage, Katharine K. Baker
Katharine K. Baker
The gay and lesbian community's response to California's Proposition 8 was strong and quick. Within days of the 2008 election, opponents of the measure had targeted its proponents, in particular the Mormon Church, as subjects for scorn. Singling out the Mormon Church on this issue was particularly ironic because to the extent that members of the Mormon Church were responsible for the success of Proposition 8, they simply did to the gay community what courts of the United States consistently did to their forebears: defined away their right to marry. In striking down individuals' rights to enter into polygamous marriages, …
Family Law: The Essentials (With K. Silbaugh), Katharine Baker
Dec 2008
Family Law: The Essentials (With K. Silbaugh), Katharine Baker
Katharine K. Baker
No abstract provided.
Caban V. Mohammed, 441 U.S. 380 (1979), Katharine Baker
Dec 2007
Caban V. Mohammed, 441 U.S. 380 (1979), Katharine Baker
Katharine K. Baker
No abstract provided.
Asymmetric Parenthood, Katharine K. Baker
Dec 2005
Asymmetric Parenthood, Katharine K. Baker
Katharine K. Baker
This analysis of the American Law Institute's Principles of Family Law, Chapter 3, examines how the Principles perceive the origins and extent of parental obligation. What is that makes someone financially responsible for a child? Perhaps surprisingly, the Drafters of this key chapter of the Principles spend remarkably little time analyzing that question. Instead, to determine who has parental obligation, the Principles rely on extant legal paternity and parenthood doctrine that is itself completely muddled. To determine the extent of parental obligation, the Principles employ a binary biological ideal of parenthood that fails to reflect reality for close to half …
Alternative Caretaking And Family Autonomy: Some Thoughts In Response To Dorothy Roberts, Katharine K. Baker
Jan 2001
Alternative Caretaking And Family Autonomy: Some Thoughts In Response To Dorothy Roberts, Katharine K. Baker
Katharine K. Baker
Dorothy Roberts's analysis of the ways in which current kinship foster care arrangements highlight the need for more state support of caregiving and perversely sever familial bonds in the African American community raises important issues for those concerned about caregiving and the legal treatment of families.' In this short response, I will address two of those issues. First, I argue that it is important to understand how state support for caregiving can reify primary caretaker norms and undermine alternative care arrangements that have proven so valuable in communities of color. Second, I suggest that attempts to strengthen family ties must …
