Introduction to the Symposium on the American Law Institute's Principles of the Law of Family Dissolution

On February 1-3, 2001, several dozen leading family law scholars joined a number of other scholars from other disciplines and family law practitioners at Brigham Young University's J. Reuben Clark Law School for a Symposium entitled The ALI Family Dissolution Principles: Blueprint to Strengthen or to Deconstruct Families? The Symposium was co-sponsored by the J. Reuben Clark Law School and the Marriage Law Project of the Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. for the purpose of examining, discussing, and debating the America Law Institute's newly approved Principles of the Law of Family Dissolution (hereinafter "Principles"). The BYU Symposium was the first academic symposium on the Principles since the American Law Institute gave its final to approve the Principles at annual meeting in May 2000. Additionally, the BYU Symposium was also one of the first academic conferences to examine domestic partners (Chapter 6 of the Principles) since the Vermont legislature enacted a "civil union" domestic partnership statute in 2000 in response to the ruling of the Vermont Supreme Court in Baker v. State.' This issue of the BYU Law Review contains half of the publishable papers produced for that pioneering symposium. The other half are published in a companion issue of the University of Utah's Journal ofLaw and Family Studies. The Principles were over a decade in the creation. The ALI project began questionably when the ALI project leaders made the decision to exclude from any discussion or consideration such fundamental issues as grounds for marital dissolution, jurisdiction, ADR possibilities, and other fundamental procedural and jurisdictional issues, The project ended with similar controversy when, as the long drafting project (over a decade in the crafting) approached completion, the Reporters significantly expanded and altered the scope of the project by adding a new chapter recognizing "domestic partners" (chapter 6) and extending to them all of the economic rights that married couples enjoy when marriages terminate. The potential impact of the Principles upon family law is tremendous. The Principles propose new regulatory standards and rules that would apply (if adopted by the states) in proceedings relating to divorce and dissolution. The subjects covered by the ALI Principles of the Law of Family Dissolution include child custody, child support, property division, alimony (renamed "compensatory payments"), antenuptial agreements (covering nonmarital cohabitation as well), and domestic partners. While some of the principles are very familiar to law professors who teach family law, many of the proposals go far beyond existing law and recommend significant policy changes, including official recognition of homosexual and extramarital concubine-like domestic partnerships, on an economic par with marriage. The prestige of the Institute, and the fact that many wellplaced lawyers, distinguished law professors, and influential judges belong to the ALI guarantees that it will have some impact. Even before the Principles were adopted by the ALI, the draft provisions had been cited and discussed in dozens of law review articles. Yet, despite the great potential impact of the Principles and despite (or, perhaps, because of) the gerrymandering of the scope of this ALI project, the Principles show little imprint of serious conceptual criticism. The ALI's process of crafting and approval left the few critics in the ALI feeling that their views were simply not heard or disregarded. It was the goal of the BYU Symposium to generate a very high level of high quality exchange of ideas about the ALI proposals. The two major themes of the BYU Symposium were: (1) How would adoption of the ALI Principles change existing family law? (2) Would those changed be good or bad-strengthen or deconstruct families? The BYU Symposium included both pro- and conPrinciples presentations from some of the finest scholarly proponents and critics of the Principles. …