Family Law Commons^™

Situating Stillbirth Within A Reproductive Justice Methodology Amidst Perilous Politics, Jamie Abrams

Book Reviews

Stillbirth and the Law, published in 2025 by the University of California Press, offers both a deeply personal and rigorously insightful examination of how law, medicine, and policy intersect around stillbirth. Jill Lens brings her full self to this work in ways that reflect deep feminist roots cultivated over years of Lens’s impressive scholarly production. Lens channels her lived experience of stillbirth into a comprehensive analysis that combines data, theory, law, narrative, policy, and pragmatic solutions.

The reader leaves the book equally feeling Lens’s deep love and longing for her son, Caleb, and equipped with a lengthy list of tools, …

“No One Can Hear You Scream”: Intimate Partner Violence And Family Justice Centers In Rural America, Jordan Stevenson

Legal Writing Competition Winners

In rural Kentucky, where cars are a necessity to traverse the rugged Appalachian Mountains and sparsely populated farmlands, “Barbara’s” abusive husband couldn’t let her get away—so he set her car aflame. Although census-defined rural areas contain only 20% of the United States population, some studies have found that intimate partner violence is more common and severe in rural areas than urban or suburban regions. 

People, especially women, in rural areas experience intimate partner violence in unique ways tied to their geographic and cultural context. Consequently, organizations, courts, and law enforcement struggle to meet the needs of affected populations in rural …

Kidfluencer Protection: Illinois’ Attempt At Expanding Its Version Of The Coogan Law., Genevieve Sloan

American University Business Law Review

On July 1, 2024, Illinois enacted pioneering legislation, which expanded its child labor laws to “[m]inors featured in vlogs.” This legislation marks the first successful attempt at protecting the finances of children in the business of social media influencing. Over the past several years, society has started recognizing the dangers of the otherwise lucrative child influencer industry, notably children’s lack of legal entitlement to their earnings.

Accordingly, the Illinois legislation began inspiring similar child labor laws in other states. This Comment analyzes whether Section 95 and Section 100 of Illinois’ Child Labor Law of 2024 maintain parental autonomy and adequately …

The Ambiguity That Isn’T: Why Same-Sex Marriage Is Legal In American Samoa, Dante Cade Harootunian, Sammi Lawrence

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell v. Hodges that prohibitions on same-sex marriage violate the equal protection guarantees of the U.S. Constitution, several government officials in American Samoa issued statements claiming that the decision had no effect in American Samoa, and, to date, no same-sex couples have

applied for a marriage license in the territory. This Article analyzes the Obergefell decision in light of other federal and territorial court decisions that determined the applicability of constitutional rights to U.S. territories and concludes that, despite the statements of local officials, the Obergefell decision applies in American Samoa, and the …

Beyond Marriage: Challenging Marital Prerequisites In State Adoption Laws Through A Constitutional And Child-Centered Lens, Alisha Glass

American University Law Review

Many state adoption laws restrict joint adoptions to married couples, thus excluding unmarried partners who share loving and committed relationships with the children they seek to adopt. These marital prerequisites reflect society’s outdated preference for the nuclear family while conflicting with adoption law’s commitment to the best interests of the child. Nonmarital families experience unequal legal protections based on marital status and geographic location. Building on the Kentucky Supreme Court’s decision in G.G. v. Cabinet for Health & Family Services, this Comment examines the limits of resolving these disparities through statutory interpretation and identifies the constitutional questions that remain …

A Woman’S Body Is Not Her Husband’S: Marital Duty And The Right To Refuse At The Ecthr, Dionejala Muhammad

Human Rights Brief

The European Court of Human Rights (“ECtHR”) issued a decision in H.W. v. France on January 23, 2025, ruling that under the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“ECHR”), specifically Article 8(1), a woman is not required to provide sex to her husband to fulfill marital duty.

Property Problems In The New Non-Marriage: Inheritance, Eliot Tracz

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

Marriage equality has been a hotly contested topic for many years, in both the court of public opinion and in courts of law. Major Supreme Court cases have found that marriage is a fundamental right, yet issues such as marriage outside of one’s race or to a person of the same gender have still been topics of litigation. At times, the very definition of marriage has been at issue, but throughout all of this litigation, courts have consistently defined marriage as a relationship between two people.

Pro-Natalism In Probate Law, Diane Kemker

American University Law Review

“Pro-natalism” is a term that has been variously used to describe any and all government policies that favor birth, babies, children, families, and population growth, as well as more focused laws that incentivize childbirth; burden, ban, or criminalize abortion and/or contraception; and otherwise disfavor the childless. Whether and to what extent U.S. law is or should be pro-natalist is central to current and ongoing debates about reproductive rights and the deeply vexed question of when life begins. A robust legal feminist literature has aimed to identify and critique pro-natalist law and policy, particularly in forms that constrain the autonomy of …

Adultery Provisions In Matrimonial Agreements, Elizabeth R. Carter

American University Law Review

Can a contract discourage your spouse from cheating or compensate you for a broken heart? Adultery penalties in marriage contracts seek to do exactly that. An adultery penalty is a financial penalty in a marriage contract triggered by a spouse’s infidelity. While many practitioners advise clients against adultery provisions in marriage contracts, some clients demand them. However, are adultery provisions enforceable? Should they be? This Article considers the sociolegal history of adultery and provides new insight into the enforceability and wisdom of adultery penalties. This Article also provides novel arguments that adultery provisions should not be enforced and calls upon …

Are Children's Rights Enough?, Clare Ryan

American University Law Review

Are parental rights or children’s rights better for protecting children and vindicating their interests? In this ongoing debate, American family law scholars and advocates are deeply divided. Children’s rights proponents often criticize the United States for failing to ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child and for denying children constitutional family rights. This critique of U.S. family law assumes that incorporating children’s rights would result in better outcomes for children. This Article challenges the assumption that children’s rights are enough to vindicate children’s interests. Instead, this Article identifies how current conceptions of children’s rights present structural barriers to …

Why Does The Federal Government Get A Pass? Applying Best Practices In Child Protection To The Circumstances Of Migrant Children And Families, Randi Mandelbaum

American University Law Review

For too long, the United States has had a separate child-caring system for migrant children and families that operates alongside our domestic child welfare systems. The latter is a robust system focused on the principles of safety, wellbeing, and permanency; while the former flouts constitutional protections, separates children from parents, and perpetuates a system that is detaining children, warehousing them in large jail-like settings at worst, and sheltering them in large congregate care facilities at best. Children are being harmed, some irreparably.

Yet, if our child welfare laws reflect what we know to be proper standards for caring for vulnerable …

Presumed Unfit: The Dual Bind Faced By Pregnant And Parenting Youth In Foster Care, Kara R. Finck

American University Law Review

Pregnant and parenting youth in foster care are subject to a range of laws, policies, and practices that expose the realities of a child welfare system structured to focus on surveillance instead of support and family regulation instead of family integrity. Informed by my experience representing foster youth who become parents, this Article considers how youth in care are presumed unfit to parent their children because of a history in foster care and their age. A youth’s status as pregnant or parenting is weaponized to subject them to additional scrutiny, threats, and a shifting burden to justify their fundamental right …

Paper Courts And Parental Rights: Balancing Access, Agency, And Due Process, Tianna N. Gibbs

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

Across the country, state legislatures have created out-of-court, form-based processes that replace the adjudicative process in traditional courts. In the family law context, these out-of-court forms allocate fundamental parental rights, principally for unmarried and single parents, who disproportionately have low incomes and are people of color. In most states, instead of presenting their requests to a judge in a courtroom, parents can sign legal forms in a hospital room to establish paternity or at their kitchen table to assign their custodial rights to a third party. When a child is born to an unmarried mother, as 40% of children are, …

Intergenerational Control: Why Genetic Modification Of Embryos Via Crispr-Cas9 Is Not A Fundamental Parental Right, Fernando Montoya

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

In The Right Direction, Family Diversity In The Inter-American System Of Human Rights, Macarena Sáez

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

This Article argues that the Inter-American System of Human Rights has contributed to a family system that embraces gender equality and non-heterosexual and gender non-conforming families. It argues that the system had, from its inception, an expansive idea of the family that included associations outside marriage. This was the basis for a robust development of the concepts of equality and non-discrimination by the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. Although the IACtHR has only decided a handful of cases related to the non-heterosexual family, its rich case law on equality and the right to …

Adding Insult To Injury: The Unconscionability Of Alimony Payments From Domestic Violence Survivors To Their Abusers, Amanda Nannarone

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Em>Mama Tried: Shifting Thinking (And Practice) In Child Welfare Cases When A Parent Is Incarcerated, Brent M. Pattison

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

Why The Legal Strategy Of Exploiting Immigrant Families Should Worry Us All, Jamie Abrams

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

This article applies a family law lens to explore the systemic and traumatic effects of modern laws and policies on immigrant families. A family law lens widens the scope of individuals harmed by recent immigration laws and policies to show why all families are affected and harmed by shifts in state power, state action, and state rhetoric. The family law lens reveals a worrisome shift in intentionality that has moved the state from a bystander to family-based immigration trauma to an incendiary agent perpetrating family trauma.

Modern immigration laws and policies are deploying legal and political strategies that intentionally sever …

Too Stupid: Intellectual Disability As A Statutory Ground For Termination Of Parental Rights, Charlotte Jayne Cooper

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Far From Now-Settled: The Supreme Court's Decision In Lozano V. Montoya Alvarez As A Violation Of Substantive And Procedural Due Process Under The International Child Abduction Remedies Act, Cassandra Erler

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

The Workplace Injunction: An Emerging But Imperfect Weapon In The Fight Against Domestic Violence, Michael D. Moberly

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

De Facto Parent And Non Parent Child Support Orders, Jeffrey A. Parness, Matthew Timko

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Beyond Balancing: Rethinking The Law Of Embryo Disposition, Mary Ziegler

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

"Everything You Need Is In Here": Missing Elements In A Trauma-Sensitive, Multiracial Framework For Foster Parentig, Binny Miller, Maya Coleman

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

No abstract provided.

The Polarization Of Reproductive And Parental Decision-Making, Jamie Abrams

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

Women’s abortion decision-making and parental decision-making in child rearing are constructed as polarized methods of decision-making. Women’s abortion decision-making is understood as myopic and individualistic. Parental decision-making is understood as sacrificial and selfless. This polarization leaves reproductive decision-making isolated, marginalized, and vulnerable while parental decision-making is essentialized, protected, and revered. Both framings are inaccurate and problematic. A unified family decision-making framework that aligns abortion decision-making and parental decision-making reveals that both forms of decision-making are more multi-dimensional, relational, and family-centered than currently understood. This article exposes the ground to be gained by crossing longstanding boundaries in family law and reproductive …

Japan's Failure To Protect Japanese-American Children From International Parental Kidnapping In Violation Of The Hague Convention On Child Abduction, Tarja Cajudo

American University International Law Review

No abstract provided.

"[R]Elegated Through No Fault Of Their Own To A More Difficult" System: Applying The Obergefell Opinion To Custody Principles, Melanie Kalmanson

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Equitable Tolling Denied: Uniform Standard Breaks Abuser's Control Within Domestic Violence, Laura E. Petkovich

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Overcoming Biased Views Of Gender And Victimhood In Custody Evaluations When Domestic Violence Is Alleged, Ruth Leah Perrin

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

A Family Is What You Make It? Legal Recognition And Regulation Of Multiple Parents, Haim Abraham

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

Multiparental family structures, in which there are more than two parents, are becoming increasingly common. Thus, they defy the social and legal conception of the nuclear family. Yet, despite the growing number of multiparental families, their legal status in most jurisdictions is not recognized, leaving various issues unaddressed and potentially risking the children’s best interests. This paper examines how the legislatures and courts of California, Canada, and the U.K. recognize and regulate multiparental families. It shows that the treatment of multiparental families varies from non-recognition of any status, through regulation of the multiparental family, to the recognition of the multiparental …