Opinion ID: 848764
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: the nature of the right involved

Text: The fundamental interest at stake in this case is the parent-child relationship. There can be no doubt that parents have a fundamental liberty interest in caring for and guiding their children, and a corresponding privacy interestabsent exceptional circumstancesin doing so without the undue interference of strangers to them and to their child. [ Troxel, 530 U.S. at 87, 120 S.Ct. 2054 (opinion of Stevens, J.).] It is cardinal ... that the custody, care and nurture of the child reside first in the parents.... Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 166, 64 S.Ct. 438, 88 L.Ed. 645 (1944). Thus, [i]t is plain that the interest of a parent in the companionship, care, custody, and management of his or her children come[s] ... with a momentum for respect lacking when appeal is made to the liberties which derive merely from shifting economic arrangements. [ Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645, 651, 92 S.Ct. 1208, 31 L.Ed.2d 551 (1972), citing Kovacs v. Cooper, 336 U.S. 77, 95, 69 S.Ct. 448, 93 L.Ed. 513 (1949) (Frankfurter, J, concurring).] Because the Constitution recognizes this fundamental interest, a presumption has been created that the natural bonds of affection lead parents to act in the best interests of their children. Parham v. J.R., 442 U.S. 584, 602, 99 S.Ct. 2493, 61 L.Ed.2d 101 (1979). Consequently, a state interest will rarely be sufficiently compelling to override parents' legitimate decisions regarding the care, custody, or management of their children.