Juvenile Law Commons^™

Legal Images Of Motherhood: Conflicting Definitions From Welfare "Reform," Family And Criminal Law, Jane C. Murphy

All Faculty Scholarship

Part I of this Article explores the traditional idealized view of motherhood that child placement statutes and court decisions reflect. These laws include statutes and case law in custody disputes between parents and in child protection proceedings under civil and criminal laws where the dispute is between the parent and the state. Part II contrasts the legal construct of motherhood that child placement laws embody with the legal image of mothers in child support and welfare law.

Part III examines the impact of these conflicting images of motherhood on a particular group of mothers -- battered women. Battered women illuminate …

Family Group Conferences As A Form Of Court Approved Alternative Dispute Resolution In Child Abuse And Neglect Cases, Jolene M. Lowry

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The problems associated with long-term foster care of children have escalated over the past decade as more abused and neglected children enter the already overworked and underfunded state child protective system& The recent Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 mandates giving preference to placement within the extended family for children who cannot be returned to their parents. Compliance with this law requires substantial changes in the policies and procedures of human services agencies in most states. This Article discusses "family group conferencing,' a new model for working with families within the system. Family Group Conferencing originated in …

Developing A Child Advocacy Law Clinic: A Law School Clinical Legal Education Opportunity, Donald N. Duquette

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Clinical legal education has become an accepted and integral complement to traditional law school curricula. Professor Duquette argues that clinical education is uniquely able to integrate the teaching of practical skills and legal doctrine, elevating students' understanding of both. Duquette maintains that a child advocacy law clinic can teach a broad range of practical skill benefit the hosting law school by providing an opportunity for interdisciplinary education as well as a public relations benefit, while simultaneously serving an important need in most communities for quality representation of all parties in child abuse and neglect cases. Most importantly, participation in a …

Second-Parent Adoption: Overcoming Barriers To Lesbian Family Rights, Maxwell S. Peltz

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

Part I of this Article will discuss some of the legal difficulties associated with co-parenting and why lesbian couples have sought second-parent adoptions. Part II will examine the particular statutory obstacles to second-parent adoptions and then analyze the various ways courts in several states have overcome these obstacles. Finally, Part III will discuss the implications of these decisions in terms of their creation of legal and social norms.

Damned For Using Daycare: Appellate Brief Of Jennifer Ireland In Ireland V. Smith, Julie Kunce Field

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

At issue is custody of three-and-a-half-year-old Maranda (date of birth: April 22, 1991). The trial court found that Maranda had an established custodial environment with her mother, Jennifer Ireland, but then nominally ordered custody changed to Steven Smith. The court's order changing custody was based on a determination that day care is an inappropriate choice for care of a preschool child, and that no one effectively can be a single parent and a student at the same time. Those findings have no factual basis in the record, no legal basis under Michigan law, and no logical or even common sense …

Parents And The State: Joining Forces To Report Incest And Support Its Victims, Lynne Olman Lourim

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

As many as 60,000 to 100,000 children each year become victims of child sexual abuse in this country, according to some estimates. These children typically suffer long-lasting effects of the abuse. This Note, in focusing on (step)father-daughter incest, looks at the predominance of males as perpetrators, daughters as victims, and mothers as non-abusers. The Note examines the dynamics within incestuous families and the characteristics common to each member in these families. It particularly considers the position of mothers in these families, who often are subservient to and financially dependent on the incest perpetrator. This Note then discusses how these mothers' …

On The Duties And Rights Of Parents, Carl E. Schneider

Articles

The law of the family is the law of the absurd. Law is a system of rules administered institutionally, and thus it must treat people categorically. When law regulates economic life, it finds people at arguably their most schematic, motivated-perhaps-by a relatively unitary conception of their interest pursued in relatively rational ways. But in family life, people are at their least schematic and at their most frustratingly human, various, idiosyncratic, irrational, and perverse, and the law's efforts to affect them are thus often quixotic. In Parents as Fiduciaries, 1 Professor Scott and Dean Scott strikingly and boldly deploy the …

Imagining Children's Rights, Suellyn Scarnecchia

Articles

Today, I will tell you some stories about real, live children, whose futures have been determined by our legal system. To speak of children's rights hypothetically, raises images of children suing to go live with their rich uncle or suing to demand a Nintendo system from their parents. I hope that by bringing you stories of the legal system's treatment of real children, you will have a better understanding of what I mean by children's rights and why they must be recognized. Although children's rights have been recognized in limited ways in the areas of free speech, criminal law and …

A Child's Right To Protection From Transfer Trauma In A Contested Adoption Case, Suellyn Scarnecchia

Articles

On August 2, 1993, I arrived at the home of Jan, Robby, and Jessica DeBoer' a few hours before the transfer. At 2:00 P.M. I would carry Jessica out of her home and deliver her to the parents who had won the case,2 her biological mother and father. This task probably would have been easier had I not spent eight days in the trial court listening to the experts explain that this transfer from one set of parents to another would harm Jessica.3 It would have been easier had I not recently obtained affidavits from other experts to persuade the …

Divorce, Custody, Gender, And The Limits Of Law: On Dividing The Child, Lee E. Teitelbaum

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Dividing the Child: Social and Legal Dilemmas of Custody by Elanor E. Maccoby and Robert H. Mnookin

Black Identity And Child Placement: The Best Interests Of Black And Biracial Children, Kim Forde-Mazrui

Michigan Law Review

The purpose of this Note is to question whether racial matching by courts and child-placement agencies serves the best interests of Black children. The principle that guides this Note's analysis is that racial matching is justified only if such a policy better serves the interests of Black children than a policy in which race is not a factor in a child-placement determination. This Note also questions whether racial matching serves the interests of biracial children and those of Black people as a cultural group.

Who Is Jessica's Mother? Defining Motherhood Through Reality, Suellyn Scarnecchia

Other Publications

The recent Baby Jessica case and others like it have renewed the nature versus nurture debate in family law. Baby Jessica's biological parents, the Schmidts, sought to obtain permanent custody of their daughter after giving her up for adoption to the DeBoer family. Their argument was one that found its basis in biology and the idea of a traditional family. On the other hand, with the assistance of Professor Scarnecchia, the DeBoers argued that it was more important forJessica's overall health to remain with her primary caretakers of two years. Courts, however, have taken a more traditional view of this …

War And P.E.A.C.E.: A Preliminary Report And A Model Statute On An Interdisciplinary Educational Program For Divorcing And Separating Parents, Andrew Schepard

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article is a report on P.E.A.C.E. (Parent Education and Custody Effectiveness), an interdisciplinary attempt to create a parent education program in New York. P.E.A.C.E. is an educational program that provides information to parents on three topics: the legal process for determining custody and child support; the effects of divorce and separation on adults; and the effects of divorce and separation on children, and how parents can help children cope with this difficult transition. P.E.A.C.E. is education-nothing more. It is not mediation or therapy. Parents do not talk to each other directly during P.E.A.C.E. sessions and the program makes no …

Reforming Welfare Through Social Security, Stephen D. Sugarman

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this Article, I first want to illustrate the connection between Social Security and AFDC-to explain the Social Security program and to demonstrate how it contributes to the welfare problem. More importantly, I then want to offer a reform proposal that builds on Social Security as a way to begin to eliminate AFDC and the current welfare problem. Simply put, I propose that Social Security should provide benefits to children with absent parents on the same basic terms on which it now provides benefits to children with deceased, disabled, or retired parents.

Designating Male Parents At Birth, Jeffrey A. Parness

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In focusing on legal designations of male parentage as of the time of birth, this Essay first reviews the methods by which such designations currently are made. The difficulties raised by contemporary methods then will be explored, together with suggested reforms involving laws that could promote earlier, more complete, and more accurate designations of male parentage as of the time of a child's birth.

Child Protection Law, Suellyn Scarnecchia

Book Chapters

The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution protect a parent's custodial rights. However, such rights are not absolute and may be terminated. There is no substantive due-process right to live together as a family. Doe v Oettle, 97 Mich App 183, 293 NW2d 760 (1980). Parents are not held to ideal standards in the care of their children but to minimum statutory standards. Fritts v Krugh, 354 Mich 97, 92 NW2d 604 (1958).

Religion And Child Custody, Carl E. Schneider

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this Essay, I want to reflect on some problems at the intersection of religion, law, and the family. Specifically, I will explore the ways courts may consider a parent's religiously motivated behavior in making decisions about the custody of children. More precisely still, I will ask two questions. First, may a court refuse to award custody because of a parent's religiously motivated behavior in a dispute between a natural mother and a natural father? Second, when should a court agree to resolve a dispute between divorced parents over the religious upbringing of their children? These are topics of quiet …

Minor Changes: Emancipating Children In Modem Times, Carol Sanger, Eleanor Willemsen

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article reports on the use of still another mechanism for removing children in conflict with their parents: statutory emancipation, the process by which minors attain legal adulthood before reaching the age of majority. Statutorily emancipated minors can sign binding contracts, own property, keep their earnings, and disobey their parents. Although under eighteen, they are "considered as being over the age of majority" in most of their dealings with parents and third parties. Thus, while emancipated minors can sign contracts and stay out late, their adult status also means that their parents are no longer responsible for the minors' support. …

Minor Changes: Emancipating Children In Modern Times, Carol Sanger, Eleanor Willemsen

Faculty Scholarship

Parents and their teenage children don't always get along. At some time during adolescent development, parents may turn into embarrassments and teenagers into domestic terrorists. For most families this is a phase. Adolescence is endured, the child accomplishes some degree of separation from parents, and the transition to adulthood advances.

In some families, however, the period is more like a siege than a phase. Conflict may last longer and be more strifeful, more intense. If the family is incapable or unwilling to resolve the tensions, an intractability may set in. In these cases, domestic tranquility seems attainable only when the …

Stemming The Modification Of Child-Support Orders By Responding Courts: A Proposal To Amend Ruresa's Antisupersession Clause, Jane H. Gorham

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Note examines the practice of using the Act to modify existing child-support orders. Part I explores the question of whether the Act's enforcement mechanisms were designed to permit the responding court to modify existing support orders. It emphasizes the problems involved with concurrent support orders and modification and describes the range of positions courts have taken to support or oppose allowing responding courts to modify support orders. Part II explores the federal child-support enforcement programs, their interstate applications, and their relationship to the Act's enforcement mechanisms. The analysis in these parts leads to Part III, which proposes an amendment …

Stepparents, Biologic Parents, And The Law's Perception Of 'Family' After Divorce, David L. Chambers

Book Chapters

The drama of divorce always contains at least two characters, a woman and a man, and often a third, a child born to the woman and the man. If you have read the other chapters of this book, you have rarely encountered any of the other persons who may be affected by a divorce, such as the children of either person from a prior marriage, or later spouses or partners of either party, or later born children of either party-all the persons who are or become stepchildren or stepparents. You have not encountered them because, in this country, with minor …

Law, Science, And History: Reflections Upon In The Best Interests Of The Child, Peggy C. Davis

Michigan Law Review

A Review of In the Best Interests of the Child by Joseph Goldstein, Anna Freud, Albert J. Solnit, and Sonja Goldstein

Beyond State Intervention In The Family: For Baby Jane Doe, Martha Minow

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Newspapers and broadcasters gave major billing to the story. Headlines announced: "The Life or Death Question of Baby Doe;" and "Baby Doe's Parents Call U.S. Action Intimidating." The medical care decisions about this infant born with spina bifida, microcephaly, and other severe disabilities, not only attracted mass media attention, but also led to both state and federal court proceedings. Legislative hearings raised the issue of her care. Many commentators debated what should happen to this infant of Long Island parents. This article instead will ask: what was all the attention about?; why are cases like this so riveting?; and might …

Exclusion Of Families With Children From Housing, George Palmer Schober

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Note attempts to resolve the most significant problems raised by discrimination against children in housing. Part I briefly analyzes the prevalence of child exclusion in different types of housing. It also provides a statistical analysis of the rental housing market to enable the reader to gauge the extent of the problem in one type of housing. Part II discusses policy arguments supporting both those who seek to exclude children and those who advocate government policies forbidding exclusion. Part III then examines the various approaches that states have adopted in this area, as well as federal implications of the issue. …

Public Policy Over Metaphysics: Wrongful Birth And Wrongful Life In Harbeson V. Parke-Davis, Inc., Eric B. Schmidt

Seattle University Law Review

The recognition of the wrongful birth and wrongful life causes of action by the Washington State Supreme Court is supported by both policy rationales and legal theories. Wrongful birth and wrongful life causes of action receive support from traditional tort principles and, more important, further public policy by deterring negligent genetic counseling and negligent preconception medical treatment. This Note describes the legal history of these claims and analyzes several issues not addressed by the Washington court. In addition, this Note criticizes a more recent decision by the court, which limits wrongful conception causes of action, because that decision conflicts with …

The Establishment Clause And Religion In Child Custody Disputes: Factoring Religion Into The Best Interest Equation, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

This Note examines when judges deciding custody disputes may consider potential custodians' religious practices without violating the establishment clause of the first amendment to the Constitution. Although courts agree that they may not prefer one parent to another for religious reasons when both parents are religious and neither parent's religious practices threaten the child's health or safety, some courts believe that they may constitutionally prefer a religious parent to a nonreligious parent. Part I argues that courts violate the establishment clause by preferring religion to nonreligion when there is no showing that the child has personal religious convictions. Part II …

The Battering Parent Syndrome: Inexpert Testimony As Character Evidence, Thomas N. Bulleit Jr.

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Note proposes that courts refuse to give further consideration to admitting the battering parent syndrome as evidence in both civil and criminal proceedings arising out of child abuse. Part I of the Note describes the syndrome as it appears in the psychological literature. Part II suggests that current judicial attitudes favor the future admissibility of the syndrome, conditioned only on an improved showing of scientific accuracy. Part III demonstrates that regardless of scientific accuracy, the character evidence rule forbids courts from admitting the battering parent syndrome. Part IV argues that the important policies underlying the character evidence rule override …

Wrongful Death Of The Fetus: Viability Is Not A Viable Distinction, Sheryl Anne Symonds

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment reviews the history of tort law treatment of the fetus who is wrongfully injured or killed. The Comment discusses case history and wrongful death statutes, with a focus on Washington law. Finally, the Comment concludes that courts should ignore viability when deciding cases of fetal wrongful death.

Rethinking The Substantive Rules For Custody Disputes In Divorce, David L. Chambers

Articles

A few states, mostly in the West and South, still retain a preference in custody disputes for placing young children with their mothers. In most other states, legislatures or courts have replaced the maternal presumption with a rule directing courts to be guided solely by the child's "welfare" or "best interests." A few legislatures have created a new preference for joint custody, directing courts to consider favorably requests by a parent for such arrangements, even over the objection of the other parent. This Article argues that the trend away from the maternal presumption is sensible, but that the current best-interests …

Illegitimacy: An Examination Of Bastardy, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Illegitimacy: An Examination of Bastardy by Jenny Teichman