tazzygirl
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Iamsemisweet
Read the actual case. I tried to copy the holding here, but I couldn't for some reason. Based on the holding, I fail to see how the grandparents could have any right to sue.
Washington Rev. Code § 26.10.160(3) permits "[a]ny person" to petition for visitation rights "at any time" and authorizes state superior courts to grant such rights whenever visitation may serve a child's best interest. Petitioners Troxel petitioned for the right to visit their deceased son's daughters. Respondent Granville, the girls' mother, did not oppose all visitation, but objected to the amount sought by the Troxels. The Superior Court ordered more visitation than Granville desired, and she appealed. The State Court of Appeals reversed and dismissed the Troxels' petition. In affirming, the State Supreme Court held, inter alia, that § 26.10.160(3) unconstitutionally infringes on parents' fundamental right to rear their children. Reasoning that the Federal Constitution permits a State to interfere with this right only to prevent harm or potential harm to the child, it found that § 26.10.160(3) does not require a threshold showing of harm and sweeps too broadly by permitting any person to petition at any time with the only requirement being that the visitation serve the best interest of the child.
I did read the actual case. I have also seen subsequesnt cases. The Trexol case was not upheld because the mother did not deny the granpdparents access, all she was willing to give was limited access... which according to the SCOTUS was enough. It was the feeling of the Court that they cannot legislate how much access is enough and how much is not enough, and that was the mother's decision to make.
Now, subsequent decisions as in Ohio...
Court Sides With Grandparents on Visits
October 11, 2005|From Times Wire Reports
The Ohio Supreme Court ruled in Columbus that grandparents can be awarded visitation rights with grandchildren over a parent's wishes in some circumstances.
The court's unanimous decision sided with maternal grandparents who wanted to visit a granddaughter after the death of her mother but were challenged by the girl's father
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/oct/11/nation/na-briefs11.3
October 2005
Ohio Court Upholds Visitation Rights for Grandparents
Reported by UPI.
October 11, 2005 The Ohio Supreme Court sided with maternal grandparents who wanted to visit a granddaughter following the death of her mother but were challenged by the girl's father. The girl's parents were never married.The grandparents had raised the girl until she was 5 years old after the mother died of cancer.Monday's ruling said Ohio law properly balances the wishes of parents and the best interests of a child.
http://www.grandparenting.org/Grandparent_Visitation.htm
In 2000, in the case of "Troxel v Granville", the United States Supreme Court addressed the issue of third party rights to seek court-enforced time with children. Within this context, a "third party" is somebody other than the child's parents. The Washington State statute examined in Troxel was not technically a "grandparenting time" statute, as it allowed “[a]ny person” to petition for visitation rights “at any time”. The Supreme Court had little difficulty in determining that the Washington statute was overbroad. While the Troxel opinion is a "plurality" decision, meaning that there is no single opinion of the court which was signed by a majority of the Justices, the decision made clear that there were certain prerequisites that grandparenting time statutes must meet in order to be constitutional. Six Justices joined opinions holding the Washington statute to be unconstitutional.
http://www.expertlaw.com/library/child_custody/grandparents_rights.html
What it means is if there is an established relationship, and a parent cuts the grandparents completely out of the child's life, then the grandparents do have the right to sue for visitation. The problem with Troxel is that the statute was too broad. They didnt strike down grandparents rights, they struck down that statute.
In regard to the Ohio case above...
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court refused Monday to consider making it harder for grandparents to win visitation rights, rejecting an appeal from a dad who went to jail to fight a court-ordered visitation.
Brian Collier had asked the justices to strike down Ohio visitation laws, on grounds that they interfere with parents’ rights to raise their families free from government interference.
Collier’s daughter is 7 and for most of her life has been the center of an emotional legal dispute in the small Ohio town of Wooster, about 30 miles southwest of Akron.
The girl’s mother, Renee Harrold, was diagnosed with cancer while pregnant and decided not to have treatment until after the child was born, according to court records. The woman died in 1999, when Brittany Renee was 2.
Collier, who never married the mother, later won custody of his daughter but refused to let the girl see her maternal grandparents.
The Ohio Supreme Court ruled that the girl should be allowed to maintain contact with the grandparents who had raised her until she was 5 years old.
Collier served a brief jail sentence in 2003 for contempt of court, for blocking the visitation. He maintains that the grandparents, Gary and Carol Harrold, are trying to turn his daughter against him.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11697913/ns/us_news-life/t/high-court-wont-hear-grandparents-rights-case/
If it was unconstitutional, I would think the Supreme Court would have been all over this.
< Message edited by tazzygirl -- 7/6/2011 2:21:20 PM >
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