Court Opinion

ID: 9787375
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 00:15:19.518454+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:55.348121
License: Public Domain

SCHUMAN, J.,
dissenting.
I agree with the concurrence that our recent cases interpreting Troxel v. Granville, 530 US 57, 120 S Ct 2054, 147 L Ed 2d 49 (2000), stand for the proposition that the state violates the Due Process Clause if it permits interference by a nonparent with a parent’s right to the care, custody, or control of his or her child unless the nonparent can establish by a preponderance of the evidence that the parent cannot or will not provide adequate love and care for the child or that state interference is necessary to avoid an undue risk of physical or psychological harm to the child.
However, the harm that can justify abridging the parental right must be far, far more serious than what has been demonstrated here. In that respect, I agree with Judge Edmonds’s able dissent. I do not fully subscribe to that dissent only because of the rule that Judge Edmonds uses to *761reach his conclusion—the “fundamental right,” “compelling state interest” rule familiar from federal Fourteenth Amendment law. The number of cases in which the United States Supreme Court has held that government action survives this level of heightened review can probably be counted on the fingers of two hands. Thus, under Judge Edmonds’s standard, the line between tolerable and intolerable parenting is predestined to fall in such a way as to make the parental presumption virtually irrebuttable. That could not be what the Troxel plurality intended.
I also agree with Judge Brewer that the resolution of cases involving disputes between parents and third parties requires a more sensitive evaluation of the child’s interest than Troxel appears to acknowledge. I do not join Judge Brewer’s dissent only because I see no need to label the child’s interest as a free-standing fundamental substantive due process right instead of an interest protected by the state as parens patriae.
Armstrong, J., joins in this dissenting opinion.