Family Law Commons^™

In Re: Matter Of E.R. C/W 73198, 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 29 (May 3, 2018), Matthew J. Mckissick

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court held that once parental rights have been terminated, NRS 128.110(2) is the appropriate standard for applying the familial placement preference—not NRS 432B.550(5).

Loving’S Legacy: Decriminalization And The Regulation Of Sex And Sexuality, Melissa Murray

Fordham Law Review

2017 marked the fiftieth anniversary of Loving v. Virginia, the landmark Supreme Court decision that invalidated bans on miscegenation and interracial marriages. In the years since Loving was decided, it remains a subject of intense scholarly debate and attention. The conventional wisdom suggests that the Court’s decision in Loving was hugely transformative— decriminalizing interracial marriages and relationships and removing the most pernicious legal barriers to such couplings. But other developments suggest otherwise. If we shift our lens from marriages to other areas of the law—child custody cases, for example—Loving’s legacy seems less rosy. In the years preceding and following Loving, …

Fear Of A Multiracial Planet: Loving’S Children And The Genocide Of The White Race, Reginald Oh

Fordham Law Review

Part I analyzes the Loving decision striking down antimiscegenation laws and examines the segregationists’ justifications for antimiscegenation laws. Next, Part II explores the historical opposition of white segregationists to interracial marriages, families, and children and argues that the principle and practice of endogamy is a central feature of Jim Crow segregation. Finally, Part III examines the present ideology of white nationalism and shows that white nationalists oppose interracial unions and families for some of the same reasons that white segregationists opposed them. Specifically, white nationalists oppose interracial families because they are one of the main factors contributing to the so-called …

The Hope Of Loving And Warping Racial Progress Narratives, Jasmine Mitchell

Fordham Law Review

Loving v. Virginia has been heralded as the catalyst for a “biracial baby boom.” Loving marked the end of the criminalization of miscegenation between nonwhite and white individuals and the automatic illegitimacy of mixed-race children in many states, and it heralded the beginning of the celebration of interracial families as part of a new multiracial, and eventual postracial, era. The construction of whiteness has been tied to the management of interracial sex and marriage, and Loving razed antimiscegenation laws that, in former Chief Justice Earl Warren’s words, had been “designed to maintain White Supremacy.” Today, the media relies on demographic …

Family Courts As Certifying Agencies: When Family Courts Can Certify U Visa Applications For Survivors Of Intimate Partner Violence, Sylvia Lara Altreuter

Fordham Law Review

Undocumented intimate partner violence survivors living in the UnitedStates have limited options for immigration relief. One of the only avenuesopen to them is the U Visa: a nonimmigrant visa established by the BatteredImmigrant Women Protection Act of 2000. To apply for a U Visa, a survivormust prove to immigration authorities that she was the victim of a crime;suffered substantial abuse; and was, is,or is likely to be helpful in theinvestigation of her abuser. The statute requires that all U Visa applicationsbe certified by an appropriate officialwho testifies to the applicant’shelpfulness with the investigation. This certification is a tremendous obstaclefor survivors: …

Race And Assisted Reproduction: Implications For Population Health, Aziza Ahmed

Fordham Law Review

This Article emerges from Fordham Law Review’s Symposium on the fiftieth anniversary of Loving v. Virginia, the case that found antimiscegenation laws unconstitutional. Inspired by the need to interrogate the regulation of race in the context of family, this Article examines the diffuse regulatory environment around assisted reproductive technology (ART) that shapes procreative decisions and the inequalities that these decisions may engender. ART both centers biology and raises questions about how we imagine our racial futures in the context of family, community, and nation. Importantly, ART demonstrates how both the state and private actors shape family formation along racial lines. …

Fear Of A Multiracial Planet: Loving'S Children And The Genocide Of The White Race, Reginald Oh

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Fifty years after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Loving v. Virginia that prohibitions against interracial marriages were unconstitutional, strong cultural opposition to interracial couples, marriages, and families continues to exist. Illustrative of this opposition is the controversy over an Old Navy clothing store advertisement posted on Twitter in spring 2016. The advertisement depicted an African American woman and a white man together with a presumably mixed-race child. The white man is carrying the boy on his back. It is a clear depiction of an interracial family. Although seemingly innocuous, this advertisement sparked a flood of comments expressing open hostility …

The School To Deportation Pipeline, Laila L. Hlass

Georgia State University Law Review

The United States immigration regime has a long and sordid history of explicit racism, including limiting citizenship to free whites, excluding Chinese immigrants, deporting massive numbers of Mexican immigrants and U.S. citizens of Mexican ancestry, and implementing a national quotas system preferencing Western Europeans. More subtle bias has seeped into the system through the convergence of the criminal and immigration law regimes.

Immigration enforcement has seen a rise in mass immigrant detention and deportation, bolstered by provocative language casting immigrants as undeserving undesirables: criminals, gang members, and terrorists. Immigrant children, particularly black and Latino boys, are increasingly finding themselves in …

Whose Sperm Is It Anyways In The Wild, Wild West Of The Fertility Industry?, Tatiana E. Posada

Georgia State University Law Review

Imagine a couple that is unable to conceive a child naturally. Luckily, they had the money and resources available to them to conceive a child through assisted reproductive technology (ART), so they decided to start their family through the use of intrauterine insemination. They selected a sperm bank and began the arduous process of selecting a sperm donor who fit the desired traits and characteristics for their child. The sperm bank matched them with an anonymous donor, Donor 9623, and assured the couple that the donor was “a healthy male with an IQ of 160, a bachelor’s of science in …

Big Brother Is Watching: When Should Georgia Get Involved In Issues Of Family Privacy To Protect Children’S Liberties?, Michelle Wilco

Georgia State University Law Review

Alecia Faith Pennington (Faith) did not officially exist until she was nineteen. Faith’s conservative, religious parents, Lisa and James, raised their nine children on the family farm just outside Kerrville, Texas, and kept their family as self-sufficient and separate from the rest of the world as possible.

The family was very insular; the parents home schooled all of the children, and the family rarely left their home, with the rare exception of going to church. Lisa and James also prohibited their children from using the Internet until they were eighteen, at which point they were only allowed limited access to …

Evolution Of The Racial Identity Of Children Of Loving: Has Our Thinking About Race And Racial Issues Become Obsolete?, Kevin Brown

Fordham Law Review

I served on the panel entitled “The Children of Loving,” which for me has two connotations. First, as an African American who married a white woman twenty years after the decision, I am a child of Loving in the sense that I was in an interracial marriage. But as a father of two black-white biracial children, I am also a father of two Lovingchildren. In this Article, I focus on the latter connotation of the “Children of Loving.” In particular, I discuss the evolution of my children’s racial identities. Due to my personal connections, I can share both an academic …

From Marriage Equality To Amazon: Marek Bute, Rwu Class Of 2005 (May 2018), Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Standing In The Way Of Our Goals: How The Best Interest Of The Child (Whatever That Means) Is Never Reached In Texas Due To Lack Of Standing For Third-Party Parents, Jessica Nation Holtman

Texas A&M Law Review

Currently in Texas, standing options for third-party nonparents seeking to file suits affecting the parent-child relationship (“SAPCRs”) are extremely limited. And, even though the standing options are codified, the evidence necessary to meet the threshold elements may be drastically different depending on the case’s location. These third parties, who have previously exercised parental responsibilities, must make showings to the court that most divorced parents could not make; and this is just for a chance to bring a claim in court. While this seems unfair, and Texas should absolutely resolve the split among its appellate courts, there is one extremely important …

How Conflict Within The House Impacts A Military Spouse: An Evaluation Of Combat-Related Special Compensation As A "Marital" Asset, Anthony Cox Jr. Esq.

Child and Family Law Journal

No abstract provided.

One Child, Two Systems: State Statutory Interpretation In The Context Of Special Immigration Status, Candace Rechtmann

Child and Family Law Journal

No abstract provided.

How Changing The Wes Kleinert Fair Interview Act And Establishing Law Enforcement Academy Training Standards Will Help The Autism Community, Randy Lambert

Child and Family Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The Loving Story: Using A Documentary To Reconsider The Status Of An Iconic Interracial Married Couple, Regina Austin

Fordham Law Review

This Essay reconsiders or reaffirms the Lovings’ status as civil rights icons by drawing on source material provided by the documentary The Loving Story. This nonfiction treatment of the couple and their lawsuit reveals their complexity as individuals and as a couple, the social relationships that made them desperate to live together and raise their children in Virginia, and the oppression they suffered at the hands of state actors motivated by a virulent white supremacy to make the Lovings’ desire to make a home for themselves in the state impossible. Part I briefly describes the Lovings’ struggle against Virginia’s Racial …

Enemy And Ally: Religion In Loving V. Virginia And Beyond, Leora F. Eisenstadt

Fordham Law Review

Throughout the Loving case, religion appeared both overtly and subtly to endorse or lend credibility to the arguments against racial mixing. This use of religion is unsurprising given that supporters of slavery, white supremacy, and segregation have, for decades, turned to religion to justify their ideologies. Although these views are no longer mainstream, they have recently appeared again in arguments against same-sex marriage and gay and transgender rights generally. What is remarkable in the Loving case, however, is an alternate use of religion, not to justify white supremacy and segregation but instead to highlight the irrationality of its supporters’ claims. …

Prejudice, Constitutional Moral Progress, And Being “On The Right Side Of History”: Reflections On Loving V. Virginia At Fifty, Linda C. Mcclain

Fordham Law Review

Looking back at the record in Loving, this Article shows the role played by narratives of constitutional moral progress, in which the Lovings and their amici indicted Virginia’s antimiscegenation law as an “odious” relic of slavery and a present-day reflection of racial prejudice. In response, Virginia sought to distance such laws from prejudice and white supremacy by appealing to “the most recent” social science that identified problems posed by “intermarriage,” particularly for children. Such work also rejected the idea that intermarriage was a path toward progress and freedom from prejudice. This Article concludes by briefly examining the appeal to Loving …

Residential Segregation And Interracial Marriages, Rose Cuison Villazor

Fordham Law Review

Part I highlights recent data on racially segregated neighborhoods and low rates of interracial marriage to underscore what Russell Robinson refers to as “structural constraints” that shape and limit romantic preferences. As I discuss in this Part, many cities today continue to be racially segregated. Notably, current data demonstrate a strong correlation between low rates of interracial marriage and racially segregated neighborhoods in those cities. By contrast, contemporary studies indicate that in cities where communities are more racially and economically integrated, the rate of interracial marriages is high. Part II argues that the association between high rates of segregation and …

Lgbt Equality And Sexual Racism, Russell K. Robinson, David M. Frost

Fordham Law Review

Bigots such as the trial judge in Loving have long invoked religion to justify discrimination. We agree with other scholars that neither religion nor artistic freedom justifies letting businesses discriminate. However, we also want to make manifest the tension between the public posture of LGBT-rights litigants and the practices of some LGBT people who discriminate based on race in selecting partners. We argue that some white people’s aversion to dating and forming relationships with people of color is a form of racism, and this sexual racism is inconsistent with the spirit of Loving. Part I provides a review of empirical …

Multiracial Malaise: Multiracial As A Legal Racial Category, Taunya Lovell Banks

Fordham Law Review

The focus of this Article is the underlying assumption of the Brookings Institution report that multiracial individuals constitute a separate racial category. My discussion of legal racial categories focuses only ongovernment “racial” definitions. Multiracial individuals should enjoy thefreedom to self-identify as they wish—and, like others, be afforded theprotections of antidiscrimination law.The question is whether a separate legal racial category is needed to provide that protection. Race in this country has been “crafted from the point of view of [white] race protection” protecting the interests of white Americans from usurpation by non whites and, unless the creation of a separate multiracial …

More Than Love: Eugenics And The Future Of Loving V. Virginia, Osagie K. Obasogie

Fordham Law Review

This Symposium is dedicated to celebrating how Loving v. Virginia paved the way for greater acceptance of multiracial families and interracial intimacy. Loving is largely understood as a case that rejected the bigotry and hatred experienced by interracial couples and affirmed the idea that law supports love across racial lines. With this narrative comes the popular understanding that Loving stands for the notion that love conquers all. This idea has shaped other legal strategies and social movements, such as the effort to have same-sex marriage legally recognized. Thus, Loving is thought of as drawing attention to the importance of romantic …

Simon De Montfort Et Le Gouvernement : Statut Des Femmes Dans Les Statuts De Pamiers (Art. 46) Avant La Magna Carta, Marjolaine Raguin-Barthelmebs

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

Promulgated at Pamiers (Languedoc, France), 1^stDecember 1212 by Simon de Montfort after its first great victory during the Albigensian Crusade, those Statutes (juridical texts) are known as the introductory act for the Coutume of Paris in Languedoc, and more specifically regarding heirs rights. Redacted for the administration of newly conquest territories, the establishment of peace and to promote catholic faith against heresy and Languedocians owners of the land, theses Statutes dispose on women in their three final articles. More particularly, the article 46 concerns nobles and heirs women and decides, thanks to matrimony institution, who (and how) they …

Should Children Have A Voice In Custodial Placement?, Emily Moore

The Review: A Journal of Undergraduate Student Research

The aim of this paper is to bring to attention the custodial placement of children with divorced parents. Essentially, this paper looks at the importance of involving the child in the process of deciding on a parenting schedule. This is done by examining how children are personally affected by this decision and arguments made to not involve children. Upon examination of these ideas, it becomes clear that during a divorce case children should be given the opportunity to share their opinion on the parenting schedule.

Low-Income Fathers, Adoption, And The Biology Plus Test For Paternal Rights, Lacey Johnson

Arkansas Law Review

This Comment purposes to explore ways in which the current “biology plus” test for determining existence of a paternal relationship disproportionately affects lower-income minority fathers who are unlikely to be fully aware of the legal hoops they must jump through to establish paternity. Part II of this Comment provides necessary background on both the history of fathers’ rights and current child-rearing in the United States. Part III lays out the development of the biology plus test. Part IV examines, in some detail, three ways in which the biology plus test disproportionately harms low-income fathers of color. Part V discusses the …

Reforming By Re-Norming: How The Legal System Has The Potential To Change A Toxic Culture Of Domestic Violence, Melissa L. Breger

Journal of Legislation

No abstract provided.

The Predictors Of Juvenile Recidivism: Testimonies Of Adult Students 18 Years And Older Exiting From Alternative Education, La Toshia Palmer

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this descriptive, qualitative study was to identify and describe the importance of the predictors of juvenile recidivism and the effectiveness of efforts to prevent/avoid juvenile recidivism as perceived by previously detained, arrested, convicted, and/or incarcerated adult students 18 years of age and older exiting from alternative education in Northern California. A second purpose was to explore the types of support provided by alternative schools and the perceived importance of the support to avoid recidivism according to adult students 18 years of age and older exiting from alternative education.

Methodology: This qualitative, descriptive research design identified …

Arbitration. A Promising Avenue For Resolving Family Law Cases?, Audrey J. Beeson

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

This paper will examine the path of arbitration in the area of family law, when it began, and how it has grown since 1990. It will discuss the division between the states that currently utilize arbitration for family law issues as well as the scope of judicial review. The paper will then discuss the history leading to, and the enactment of, the Uniform Family Law Arbitration Act. Next, it addresses Nevada’s legislative history, when arbitration of family law matters was considered, and consequently what a Nevada Family Law Arbitration Act would potentially look like. Finally, it will include a view …

Fisco V. Department Of Human Services: The Inequity Of Equitable Defenses In Child Support Arrearage Cases, Rebecca C. Raskin

Maine Law Review

On August 8, 1995, using a federal law targeting the most egregious deadbeat fathers, FBI agents arrested Jeffrey Nichols for failing to pay approximately $580,000 in child support. Although the law is fairly new, the problem of child support enforcement has troubled this country for decades. In the early 1970s, child support enforcement was so inadequate that the federal government spent $7.6 billion annually on welfare to provide for single parents. The government has tried to remedy the problem, but seventy-five percent of custodial mothers in this country continue either to lack child support orders or to receive less than …