Book Description

-- Judith Wallerstein

Customer Reviews (2)

custody tends to be economically based
This book is fair and comprehensive and, thankfully, free of feminist cant and propoganda. I learned much even though I know the material fairly well. My major insight was that custody has always been based on finding someonewho will support the child, indentured servant or divorced wife and protectthe State from having to pay. The change from father custody to mothercustody has forced the State to become increasingly effective at requiringthe parent with money to give the money to the other parent, allowingcustody to be given to the less economically viable parent.

Excellent Research & Flawed Conclusions
Mason covers the history of legal custody with the exacting detail of a trained scholar.However, her conclusion that the "best interest of the child," is best served without regard for the best best interest of the parent will give an entire new generation of judiciary the opportunity to vacate parent's civil rights in favor of their children and the state.

Her idea of giving each child in a divorce their own legal representation will most certainly serve the best interests of attorneys everywhere, while leaving middle-class parents pennyless in their pursuit of justice.

For legal education and precedent this book rates a 10.For the long-term health of civilization, it deserves a 0. ... Read more

Book Description
This book contains an exhaustive overview of the historical, legislative, executive, and judicial processes relating to juvenile justice and identifies the parameters and constraints of the juvenile justice system in India. ... Read more

Book Description
This book is concerned with the regulation of family relationships, in particular the issue of openness and contact in the many different family situations in which it may arise. ... Read more

Book Description
The book presents the first sustained theoretical analysis of what rights children should possess in connection with state decision making about their personal relationships which the state does in numerous aspects of family law, including paternity, adoption, custody and visitation, termination of parental rights, and grandparent visitation. It examines the nature and normative foundation of adults' rights in connection with relationships among themselves and then assesses the extent to which the moral principles underlying adults' rights apply also to children. It concludes that the law should ascribe to children rights equivalent (though not identical) to those which adults enjoy, and this would require substantial changes in the way the legal system treats children, including a reformation of the rules for establishing legal parent-child relationships at birth and of the rules for deciding whether to end a parent-child relationship. ... Read more

Book Description
The six sections that divide this book discuss your rights in areas such as school, home, and work. More than forty chapters contain a spectrum of topics ranging from dress codes and curfews to drug abuse and discrimination. In addition, a state-by-state legal guide provides a quick reference of individual state laws regarding such concerns as your drivers license, age of majority, marriage, and child labor law.

Included within the text are Teen Tip and Parent Tip boxes that highlight specific suggestions from the author. An extraordinary list of organizations, websites, and agencies identify valuable sources of additional information. Hotlines are listed in the referencesection to provide quick help in an emergency situation.

While written specifically for teens, this book can also serve as an outstanding guide for adults who are seeking to understand the rights and responsibilities that teenagers have in todays society.

More than forty chapters cover a spectrum of topics:
- freedom of expression
- school attendance and discipline
- discrimination
- becoming a legal adult
- parents' divorce
- insurance
- assault
- alcohol, tobacco, drugs, weapons
- eating disorders
- birth control
- abortion
- workplace issues
- owning property
- the court system ... Read more

Book Description

Canada signed the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child over a decade ago, yet there is still a lack of awareness about and provision for children's rights.

Book Description
Child rights is an important area of scholarship the world over and is gaining great significance as an area of research in the first decade of 21st century. Protection of child rights is now considered an integral part of human rights. The recent years have witnessed a shift in the orientation and perspective of child rights. The book addresses the issue of child rights from an interdisciplinary perspective and covers a wide gamut of issues such as right to family environment, right to parental care, right against sexual and economic exploitation, right to development and survival.The author has critically examined the recent national and international initiatives, the present laws, court decisions, the recent amendments and the law reforms suggested by the law commission for setting an agenda towards protection of child rights and their empowerment.This book will attract a wide range of readers including lawyers, social workers, sociologists, child welfare agencies, civil libe rty groups, policy makers, NGOS, and institutions like UNICEF AND ILO. ... Read more

Book Description
Legal and political rights-based analysis of how the US legal system affects American children. It examines the barriers to childsensitive public policy, and the true legal status of children with regard to poverty, education, health, special needs, child care, child abuse, juvenile crime and detention, reproductive rights, custody and civil liberties. Describing over 190 leading cases, and including probing commentaries and recent statistics, Child Rights & Remedies is a unique tool for anyone concerned about the wellbeing of the nation's children. ... Read more

Book Description
Millions of fathers are currently fighting for custody of their children. Many wonder if they will ever again be an important part of their children's lives. This accessible book covers every aspect of the custody process, including:-- Protecting the parent/child relationship as a break-up occurs-- Determining when to settle and when to litigate -- Explanations concerning the court determination of a fair level of child support ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

A must read-but with another book,
'Fathers rights' is an excellent book for all those many thousands of us trying to keep in touch with much loved kids after divorce. I would strongly recommend reading FAMILY COURT HELL (available on amazon) with this book too. FAMILY COURT HELL is about one man's case that went to court a record 133 times and launched the worldwide Fathers 4 Justicecampaign. The FAMILY COURT HELL case eventually resolved, but with no thanks to any court or judge, but instead with a combination of the fathers determination, the international protests he launched and his kids becoming old enough to take on the mother and the family law system-which they won! A must read, both books, gives you hope through the darkest of days.

Greatest Book Period
I have to say it is an excellent book. I do not have any children, but a
lot of my friends do. Some are married and some aren't. I have convinced 4
of them to read the book and 3 out of the 4 finished. I learned so much
from this book. All my friends have said the same thing that I have after
reading the book. You are very clear expressing your point. That makes a world of difference in reading a book, is how easy it is to understand. I am into family law and this has to be the best book I have ever read period. Not just for a law book, but for any book, it has changed my life. It makes me
think about every step I take.

FATHERS HAVE RIGHTS
I just wanted to say thank you for taking the time to write this book. I wish I would have stumbled upon this book prior to my daughter's arrival. Currently, my daughter is 21 months old. If I would have had the knowledge in this book earlier, I could have made things a lot easier for myself and my daughter.

It's not over yet though . . .

Indispensable
For a non-custodial father, this book is tantamount to having a lawyer, a friend and a child-advocate at your becken call 24-7.

"Words From the Wise"
Thank you for writing this book!The author put a lot of experience and thought into his writing.The information in here surely saved me time, money and anguish from what would have been fruitless efforts.Thanks for carrying this Amazon.com. ... Read more

Book Description
This teachers pack is a comprehensive resource to help raise awareness of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. It provides activities, workshop details, discussion notes, games and lots of ideas to raise awareness of the UN Convention in general, and of two key articles, 12 and 28, in particular.

The pack focuses on how young people and children can take greater responsibility and can be enabled to develop the skills required to achieve the aims of the Convention. The activities help to explore key issues such as assertiveness, empathy, consideration and power. The pack can be used either for an intensive three-day course, or for regular lessons in PSHE and Citizenship sessions. ... Read more

Book Description
The legal status, responsibilities and rights of men who are fathers - married or unmarried, cohabiting or separated, biological or social in nature - is a topic with a long and well-documented history. Yet recent developments in a number of countries suggest a growing politicisation of the relationship between law and fatherhood. In some countries, an increasingly vocal, visible and well-organised fathers' rights movement has been credited with influencing perceptions of the politics of family justice. Fathers, it is argued, have become the new victims of family law justice systems that have swung 'too far' in favour of mothers. Armed with such claims, fathers' rights activists have set out to achieve a range of legal reforms, most notably in the areas of child support law and contact and residence rights following separation. This book presents an attempt to understand these developments. Bringing together leading international commentators it provides a careful, critical and comparative analysis of the work of fathers' rights activists, the role law has played in their campaigning, their legal strategies, their success (or otherwise) in achieving legal reform, similarities and divergences with the women's movement, and the relationship between fathers' rights movements and the societies that frame them.In addition to Collier and Sheldon, contributors include: Susan B Boyd (University of British Columbia, Canada), Jocelyn Crowley (Rutgers University, USA), Maria Eriksson (Goteborg University, Sweden), Keith Pringle (Aalborg University, Denmark), Helen Rhoades (Melbourne University, Australia), and Carol Smart (Manchester University, UK). ... Read more

Book Description
With changes in demographics, grandparents are living longer and want to spend as much time as they can with their grandchildren. There is no other book in the marketplace that so clearly addresses the rights of this growing population.

This timely revision explains the ramifications for all 50 states relating to the recent U.S. Supreme Court case of Troxell vs. Granville. While the case took several twists and turns through the Washington state legal system, the final outcome held that the judge's version of the "child's best interest" is not the only determination that is used. A court must take into account a fit parent's version as well.

Divorced and deceased parents also are topics addressed in relation to grandparents' rights. In addition, easy-to-use, blank tear-out forms are available for immediate use, if warranted. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Legal Forms
Turns out I won't be needing these forms afterall, but someone else may find them helpful.

"How To" get visitation in court when barred by mom/dad
The author presents the basic legal process on obtaining visitation rights via petitioning the circuit court in your state.The steps here are only for those who cannot negotiate reasonable visitation directly with the custodial parent.The book includes brief suggestions on hiring an attorney.The book is fairly dry and basic, with little commentary.An alternative would be to purchase a how-to divorce guide an apply the process to a grandparent motion; you may receive more in-depth information from a "how to" divorce guide on the court process than from this book. ... Read more

Book Description
Mower deals first with the significance, origin, and development of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, then describes and analyzes its substantative content, procedures, and mechanisms for the Convention's implementation. He concludes with an examination of the factors that are most likely to determine the rate of progress toward the realization of the convention's goals. Based on official records, relevant secondary sources, and observations of members of the Convention's implementary organ, the book will be of considerable use to scholars and researchers in the fields of human rights and children's welfare. ... Read more

Book Description
Presenting a new framework for understanding the complex but vital relationship between legal history and the family, Michael Grossberg analyzes the formation of legal policies on such issues as common law marriage, adoption, and rights for illegitimate children.He shows how legal changes diminished male authority, increased women's and children's rights, and fixed more clearly the state's responsibilities in family affairs.Grossberg further illustrates why many basic principles of this distinctive and powerful new body of law—antiabortion and maternal biases in child custody—remained in effect well into the twentieth century. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Dry but the general argument holds up
Any attempt to assemble a detailed picture of society must take into consideration the legal structures that function within that culture. A court system works in two ways: judges influence society through its rulings as often as society at large influences the judicial system. Michael Grossberg's "Governing the Hearth: Law and the Family in Nineteenth-Century America" is a work that combines a comprehensive examination of early American law with aspects of social history in an attempt to arrive at an overarching theme of the development of family law--what would later become "domestic relations" law--and its influence on the larger society. Grossberg relies heavily on legal sources, including appellate court rulings and legal tracts, to construct a three-stage progression of American family law.

According to the book, colonial family law was patriarchal in structure, tied closely to the state, and relegated women and children to the control of men. The American Revolution threw the colonial legal system, already under stress from a variety of factors including but not limited to the ability of settlers to leave for new lands, into chaos. What appeared in its place after a lengthy period of legal transformation involving an amalgamation of English legal principles and an emerging belief in American common law was a form Grossberg calls the republican family. The republican unit displaced the old patriarchal legal system in favor of laws that recognized individuals within the family. Too, this new form believed that state intervention in domestic matters was an evil best avoided. From the middle to the end of the nineteenth century, family laws across the board came under frequent assault from social reformers seeking to increase the role of the state in every aspect of the family. The end result was a hybrid of republican values and state intervention, of judicial discretion and legislative directives.

The author examines courtship contracts, nuptials, the fitness of those seeking to marry, contraception and abortion, the legal rights of illegitimate offspring, and custody rights. Repeatedly, Grossberg contends that the courts took the initiative in constructing a body of laws and rulings that supported individual rights within the family. Nowhere is this support more apparent than in laws concerning the rights of women and children. Custody cases tossed out the old concepts of colonial patriarchy, in which fathers held the ultimate power over spouses and children, and replaced it with a new system that allowed mothers to keep their children in cases of family disintegration. As for children, judges began allowing illegitimate offspring to petition for shares of family estates, something that was never allowed under the male oriented English law. Moreover, magistrates considered the emotional and physical well being of children, arguing that the "best interests of the child" required a reassessment of the father's dominance in family life. In this way and many others, argues Grossberg, judges assumed a patriarchal function in the American family.

"Governing the Hearth" is at its most fascinating describing the issues of birth control during the nineteenth century. The turmoil over this subject today tends to obscure how unimportant the issue was in the early part of the nineteenth century. American jurists subscribed to a belief stretching back into medieval times that claimed an abortion was not a sin or crime until the baby moved inside the womb. Called "quickening," this belief stood as accepted law until social reformers began agitating for new rulings against abortions performed at any stage of impregnation. Likewise, contraceptives came under attack from figures such as Andrew Comstock, who convinced Congress to pass laws banning the use of medicines and devices sent through the mail. One reason these chapters intrigue is because they show the relationship between the states and the federal government. During the early to mid nineteenth century, state's rights carried more weight than the powers of the federal government. The issues surrounding abortions are so controversial today that it staggers the imagination to realize there was a time when individual states decided the issue. Grossberg unfortunately never mentions how state versus federal rights played a part in family law.

The chapters on birth control laws succeed as well because they constitute one of the few areas in which the author links social history with his legal research. It is in these sections that the reader encounters the people involved in both sides of the issues, the unfortunate souls caught up in the tumult the courts experienced as the social reformers won their battles. Far too often the issues and court cases covered in this book seem like they float beyond the reach of any social, political, or economic realities. In some cases there can be little question as to why the courts dealt with certain issues. Even a cursory knowledge of American history explains why issues arose over the polygamy question in what is present day Utah. The same goes for miscegenation and the incorporation of freed slaves into preexisting marriage laws. But other parts of the book raise questions about what inspired legal changes during a particular time. On several occasions, Grossberg resorts to vague references about Victorian era perceptions regarding female behavior, specifically in the chapter on breach of marriage contracts. This explanation seems overly simplistic.

"Governing the Hearth" ultimately does make a compelling case for its central thesis, namely that the American legal system went through three distinct phases as outlined above. The book also convincingly argues that the fortunes of women and children improved greatly during the nineteenth century, and does so without overestimating their gains. For example, while women could retain custody of their children in the event of family disintegration they still had to fit societal standards of good conduct as defined by a patriarchal mentality. But the fact that women began to emerge as individuals with definite rights was family law's most significant contribution during the nineteenth century, laying the groundwork for greater gains in the next 100 years.

... Read more