Family Law Commons^™

Critical Applications And Proposals For Improvement Of The Uniform Interstate Family Support Act And The Full Faith And Credit For Child Support Orders Act, Patricia W. Moore

Faculty Articles

The problems inherent in interstate child and spousal support enforcement have been lamented for at least a half century. The federal and state governments have taken numerous steps to enhance interstate establishment and collection of support. Two of the latest steps in this process were the 1992 promulgation of the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act ("UIFSA") and the 1994 adoption of the federal Full Faith and Credit For Child Support Orders Act ("FFCCSOA"). The 1996 federal "welfare reform" bill' affected both of these statutes by requiring the states to pass UIFSA by January 1, 1998 and by amending FFCCSOA …

Lawyers' Roles In Child Protection, Donald N. Duquette

Book Chapters

What roles and responsibilities do lawyers assume in civil child protection cases? As distinguished from other legal proceedings which may grow from a case of child maltreatment, civil child protection proceedings focus on the child and the child's needs. These civil cases are not concerned with punishing an offender, recovering money damages from a person or institution who may have harmed a child, or suspending someone from a professional license. The focus here is on the proper care and custody of the child.

Valuation Of Closely Held Business Interests, Edwin T. Hood, John J. Mylan, Timothy P. O'Sullivan

Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Lawyers As Nonlawyers In Child-Custody And Visitation Cases: Questions From The Legal Ethics Perspective Response, Bruce A. Green

Faculty Scholarship

The Child Advocacy Clinic at Indiana University School of Law-Bloomington ("Indiana Clinic") takes as a premise that, in custody and visitation disputes, children may be best served by lawyers as guardians ad litem, rather than by lawyers qua lawyers, on one hand, or by nonlawyer guardians ad litem, on the other. In contrast, participants in a national conference at Fordham Law School' concluded two years ago that "[a] lawyer appointed or retained to serve a child in a legal proceeding should serve as the child's lawyer." That is, the lawyer should regard the child as a client, not a ward. …

Child Care Policy And The Welfare Reform Act, Peter R. Pitegoff

Faculty Publications

This article sketches the 1996 Welfare Reform Act's major changes with particular attention to federally subsidized child care for low-income families.

Two Parents Are Better Than None: Whether Two Single, African American Adults--Who Are Not In A Traditional Marriage Or A Romantic Or Sexual Relationship With Each Other--Should Be Allowed To Jointly Adopt And Co-Parent African American Children, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

This article proposes an additional adoption model to allow joint adoption and co-parenting by single African Americans who are not in a traditional marriage relationship with each other and not in a romantic or sexual relationship with each other. Under this model, for example, two friends, two sisters, two brothers, a sister and a brother, etc., could jointly adopt and co-parent a child. If some new model such as this one is not devised, many single blacks may hesitate to take on the entire adoption responsibility alone. As a result, many black children will continue to go without any parents. …

Ohio House Bill 419: Increased Openness In Adoption Records Law, Wendy L. Weiss

Cleveland State Law Review

Across the country, states have been enacting legislation to provide more information to adoptees about their birth. In 1995, the Ohio legislature passed House Bill 419. The bill will reform Ohio's adoption law, especially in the area of open adoption records. This Note will analyze House Bill 419 amidst the current move toward increased openness and the controversy surrounding this move. First, this Note will examine the history of secrecy in adoption in the United States and in Ohio. Second, it will explain the changes in adoption records enacted by House Bill 419 and the effects of the abortion controversy …

Dutch Uncle Sam: Immigration Reform And Notions Of Family, Lolita Buckner Inniss

Publications

No abstract provided.

Equality Under The Law Or Annihilation Of Marriage And Morals? The Same-Sex Marriage Debate, Germaine Winnick Willett

Indiana Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Marriage Today: Legal Consequences For Same Sex And Opposite Sex Couples, David L. Chambers

Articles

Laws that treat married persons in a different manner than they treat single persons permeate nearly every field of social regulation in this country -- taxation, otrts, evidence, social welfare, inheritance, adoption, and on and on.

Polygamy And Same-Sex Marriage, David L. Chambers

Articles

In the American federal system, state governments bear the responsibility for enacting the laws that define the persons who are permitted to marry. The federal government, throughout our history, has accepted these definitions and built upon them, fixing legal consequences for those who validly marry under state law. Only twice in American history has Congress intervened to reject the determinations that states might make about who can marry. The first occasion was in the late nineteenth century when Congress enacted a series of statutes aimed at the Mormon Church, prohibiting polygamy in the Western territories and punishing the Church and …

At The Intersection Of Bankruptcy And Divorce: Property Division Debts Under The Bankruptcy Reform Act Of 1994, Meredith J. Harbach

Law Faculty Publications

Bankruptcy has long had unique implications for divorce settlements and debts between ex-spouses. Historically, some marital debts owed from one ex-spouse to another were excepted from the traditional policy of "discharge. " Bankruptcy law distinguished between debts in the nature of alimony, maintenance, and support, which were protected from discharge, and property division debts, which were not. This distinction often had harsh consequences for creditor ex-spouses. Reeently, Congress enacted the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1994, in part to ameliorate this problem. The amended Bankruptcy Code providP..s better protection for some property division debts. In this Note, Ms. Johnson argues that …

Children's Rights Vs. Adult Free Speech: Can They Be Reconciled, Loftus Becker

Faculty Articles and Papers

No abstract provided.

Scientific Testing & Proof Of Paternity: Some Controversy And Key Issues For Family Law Counsel, Christopher L. Blakesley

Scholarly Works

Blood and tissue testing, especially DNA matching, have become important elements of both criminal and paternity or maternity litigation. Such scientific testing has become so important that it has taken on aspects that may cause it to benefit or to do harm to the judicial process or to any given case. This article focuses on the value and the dangers surrounding this interesting subject.

The 1995 Louisiana Supreme Court decision in Pace v. State reemphasized the importance of DNA testing generally and the significance of blood and tissue genetic testing used to exclude paternity. The advances in and importance of …

Intimate Violence And The Problem Of Consent, Jane H. Aiken

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The juxtaposition of intimacy with violence is striking. Intimacy implies a closeness and a vulnerability that is treasured and inviolate. Intimacy should foreclose the possibility of violence. Intimate violence should be an oxymoron. Yet, intimacy sometimes creates its own special kind of violence, one that can erupt into rape or assault. On a less physical level, intimacy may cause violence to a woman's personal integrity and economic independence.

Intimate violence manifests itself with a certain subtlety that forces women to walk a careful tightrope in order to avoid threatened harm. This essay is about that tightrope: the double binds women …

Twisted Interests: People In Interest Of S.A.H. And The State Of Open Adoptions In South Dakota, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

In People in Interest of S.A.H., the South Dakota Supreme Court held that open adoptions, or post-adoption visitation by the natural parents, while not prohibited under South Dakota law when in the best interests of the child, should only be mandated when the trial court finds that it is in the best interests of the child by clear and convincing evidence. The court also instructed trial courts to weigh the needs of the child, the effect on integration with the new family, and the potential effect on the pool of other prospective adoptive parents. This decision, while securing judicial enforcement …

University Of Richmond Law Review

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Annual Survey Of Virginia Law: Domestic Relations, Deanna D. Cook, Player B. Michelsen

University of Richmond Law Review

The General Assembly did not take any action regarding the Family Court issue in 1997. In 1996, funding for the family court was delayed until June 1, 1998, subject to state funds being "sufficient to provide adequate resources ... for the court to carry out the purposes of [Virginia Code section 20-96] and to fulfill its mission to serve children and families of the Commonwealth."

The Use Of Mediation And Arbitration For Resolving Family Conflicts: What Lawyers Think About Them, Mary Kay Kisthardt

Faculty Works

The use of alternative methods for resolving family conflict has increased significantly in the past few years, but many attor­neys are still wary. In an effort to discover some of the sources of this hesitation as well as identify support for "alternative" processes, the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers sur­veyed its members concerning the use of dispute resolution methods. The purpose of this study was to ascertain attorneys' perceptions of the advantages and disadvantages of the two most commonly used alternative dispute resolution mechanisms: me­diation and arbitration. Whether clients will continue to use these methods depends in great part on …

The Removal Of Adam's Rib: The Creation And Polarization Of Male And Female Virtues, Ana M. Novoa

Faculty Articles

Soft virtues, normally associated with women, have been deemed to have no legal, market or public value, and this has caused problems within American society. The devaluation of cooperative and nurturing virtues, coupled with the dangerous myth of independence and self-reliance, and general acceptance of consumption as a positive attribute, have had a profound effect on American society as a whole and, in particular, on general views on the care of children and other dependent members of our society. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, the composition and character of the family were very different because the family was not a …

Setting Standards For Parenting - By What Right?, James G. Dwyer

Faculty Publications

Mental health professionals, like other professionals involved in family
matters, feel constrained when advocating for the interests of children by the belief
that parents are entitled to custody and control of their children's lives, regardless of
what others may think of their parenting behavior, absent severe harm to the children.
This belief is morally untenable, and the legal doctrine of parental rights that is its
concrete embodiment is inconsistent with other well-established legal principles and
should be abandoned. Children alone should have legal rights in connection with their
upbringing, and those rights should include an entitlement to much higher standards …

Good Of Marriage And The Morality Of Sexual Relations, John M. Finnis

Journal Articles

This article examines the morality of sexual relations, referencing the views of many other scholars on the subject including Aquinas, Grisez, Noonan, and Koppelman.

The Indian Child Welfare Act In The Face Of Extinction, Sloan Phillips

American Indian Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Glimmer Of Hope: A Proposal To Keep The Indian Child Welfare Act Of 1978 Intact, Jose Monsivais

American Indian Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reassessing Fault Factors In No-Fault Divorce, Peter N. Swisher

Law Faculty Publications

The purpose of this article is not to "turn back the clock" through the rehabilitation of fault grounds as the sole means for securing a divorce in America. Rather, this article will explore the ways in which fault-based factors, when applied to serious or egregious marital misconduct that significantly contributes to the marital breakdown, may still be utilized in order to bring about enhanced social, economic, and legal protection to spouses on divorce, while concurrently establishing a greater sense of responsibility and accountability in marital relationships.

The Right To Appointed Counsel In Termination Of Parental Rights Proceedings: The State's Response To Lassiter, Rosalie R. Young

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Hague Convention On The Civil Aspects Of International Child Abduction: Commencing A Proceeding In New York For The Return Of A Child Abducted From A Foreign Nation, Custody, Background And Purpose Of The Hague Convention,, Stephanie Vullo

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Foreword, Katharine B. Silbaugh

Faculty Scholarship

This special section of The Boston University Public Interest Law Journal addresses the issue of transracial adoptions. Few topics within family law generate as much controversy as the placement of Black or other minority and mixed race children for adoption with white families. Although transracial placement could in theory apply to the placement of white children with mixed race and Black families, in practice it has not. The predominant practice of matching adoptive children with adoptive parents of the same race has come under increasing scrutiny in recent years as many older and difficult to place minority children wait in …

Property Distribution Physics: The Talisman Of Time And Middle Class Law, Margaret F. Brinig

Journal Articles

Should the young professional's spouse get some share in a newly acquired career while the young military officer's will not? Does the division between alimony and property make any sense, given no-fault divorce? Is reimbursement for lost career opportunities plus a share in the couple's tangible property fair compensation for a divorcing spouse? Such difficult questions frame this piece, which will also—and I believe necessarily—digress into the nature of marriage, the duties of parenting, and modern divorce philosophy.

The Good Of Marriage And The Morality Of Sexual Relations: Some Philosophical And Historical Observations, John M. Finnis

Journal Articles

This article examines the morality of sexual relations, referencing the views of many other scholars on the subject including Acquinas, Grisez, Noonan, and Koppelman.