Divorce law change gaining attention - LA

Divorce law change gaining attention

Excerpts:

Hailed as the first uniformly applicable legislation since “no-fault” was introduced in 1969 that makes divorce harder to get, Act 743 doubles the living-separate-and-apart waiting period from six months to one year when minor children would be affected by a no-fault divorce. If it is demonstrated that one spouse is guilty of child or spousal abuse, the current waiting period remains unaffected.

Alexander justified his legislation on the basis that divorce hurts children: “We know that in one-parent families, a child is twice as likely to drop out of school, three times as likely to become pregnant as a teenager, six times more likely to be in poverty and 12 times more likely to be incarcerated.” And he cited a study that said the change could cut the divorce rate by 23 percent.

Sen. Bob Kostelka, a retired judge who led the fight for the law in Louisiana’s Senate, reasoned that divorces “were often granted before the couple had worked out issues of child custody and support. That removed the option of reconciliation, because they would be divorced before they had settled important issues” that might have prompted meaningful counseling.

Louisiana Family Forum Action supported this reform legislation that aligns with recent polling data showing that 60 percent of Louisianians believe “divorce should be more difficult to get for couples with minor children than other couples.” A Time-CNN national poll has agreed with these findings.

Moreover, a study by Dr. Linda Waite revealed that “86 percent of unhappily married people who stick it out, find that, five years later, their marriages are happier.” Three-fifths who said their marriages were unhappy in the late 1980s and who stayed married, said their marriages were either “very happy” or “happy” when reinterviewed in the early 1990s.
Act 743 becomes the first enactment in pursuance of a 2001 study by the Louisiana Law Institute urging the Legislature to consider a number of divorce reforms, including longer cooling-off periods.

Quicker, Cheaper 'No-Fault' Divorces Proposed - New York

Quicker, Cheaper 'No-Fault' Divorces Proposed

ALBANY - New Yorkers would no longer have to prove a spouse cheated or was abusive to get a quick, less costly divorce under a new "no-fault" proposal. New York is the only state lacking some version of a no-fault divorce law. Efforts to make divorce easier in New York have failed, even though supporters argue contested cases extend bad marriages, encourage dishonest court testimony and can be traumatic for spouses and their children.

A state Senator, John DeFrancisco, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he is supporting a proposal that would allow a divorce to go through in 30 days if a couple has resolved all of its economic and custody issues.

"It's not a straight no-fault, but it goes a long way to eliminate court proceedings that are brought just so people don't have to wait a year," the Onondaga County Republican said.

The head of the Assembly's Judiciary Committee, Assemblywoman Helene Weinstein, said she would consider no-fault divorce only if other provisions were put in place to protect victims of domestic violence and the economic interests of non-working spouses.

THE NO-BLAME GAME: WHY NO-FAULT DIVORCE IS OUR MOST DANGEROUS SOCIAL EXPERIMENT

The latest article by Stephen Baskerville can be accessed at Fathers for Life.

The article was originally published in Crisis Magazine and will eventually be available on their website as well.

New York - Opinion Articles on No Fault Divorce

New York has been considering a bill to turn it into a no fault divorce state. Below are excerpts from opinion articles both for and against. Link to see the entire article.

Time for no fault divorce? NO : Proponents also argue that New York needs no-fault because we are almost the only state without unilateral no-fault. That means that one party, with no grounds - legal reasons - for divorce, can walk out, abandon the family and then claim that abandonment as a ground - legal reason - for divorce.

By not encouraging Separation Agreements, more cases will be sent into court. The failure to negotiate drives the issues of child custody, child and spousal support and property division into court, where women continue to face gender bias, a fact admitted by the court administration itself.

Do we need divorce reform? Yes! We have a whole list of reforms needed in New York. Among them are:
1. A bill that requires judges to award attorney fees and expert fees during the divorce action to the spouse without access to the marital money to "level the playing field."
2. Better medical coverage from the spouse who has the coverage to the noncovered spouse after divorce, such as in Massachusetts.
3. Custody awards that provide stability to children after divorce by having the children live with the parent who did most of the care-giving during the marriage.
We would like to see these and some other reforms to current law before we consider no-fault divorce.

Christ, I copied almost the entire article. Just so we all know - while my position on fault/no fault divorce has not quite yet been cemented- I find this article atrocious. I might eventually decide I fall on the side of preferring fault divorce - but never for any of these reasons. In fact, having read this all of the sudden find no fault much more appealing that I have previously.

We all need to know that the NO editorial was authored by: Kozak and Jacobs, are co-chairs of National Organization for Women's Domestic Relations Law TaskForce in New York. So that explains the "reforms."

My take on these "reforms" is that one parent wants to be able to access the money of the other parent for purposes of litigation - but that same parent does not want to "share" parenting responsibilities - that they were likely able to be the primary caregiver of as the other party was out making an income with which to support that arrangement. So what NOW is saying - share the money, not the kids. What a wonderful message for liberated women to be espousing.

Anyway, I digress, on to the Yes editorial:

Time for no-fault divorce? YES : Individuals here must prove cruelty, which is the infliction of emotional or physical pain, adultery or spousal desertion (or, no sex) for at least one year.

Because of New York's divorce law, some couples agree for one to be at "fault." But there is no purpose served by using fault-based divorce rules in ways that lead to disrespect for the law.

Some have argued that we shouldn't make it easier to get divorced because this will lead to unnecessary breakups of more couples. But experience with no-fault systems in other states shows this is unfounded and divorce rates 10 years later were no higher than before the change.

Litigants should not feel compelled to lie about "fault" to end their marriages. It is time for New York to join the 48 states that have already adopted no-fault divorce.

Standard is president of the New York State Bar Association

Utah Bill to Eliminate No Fault Divorce Tabled

Excerpts below, full article at the Salt Lake Tribune

Divorce proposal heads to counseling Withdrawn: A lawmaker's plan to eliminate no-fault breakups is referred to a task force for study

A Utah lawmaker who wanted to eliminate most no-fault divorces has dropped her legislation. Instead, West Jordan Republican Rep. Peggy Wallace plans to send the contentious issue to a state task force for further study.

"Sometimes, when you get into a bill, you realize there are other issues that need to be looked at," Wallace said Tuesday.

As originally written, her House Bill 56 would have blocked couples who had been married for more than 10 years or who had minor children from divorcing for "irreconcilable differences" - the most common grounds for dissolving a union. They still could have divorced, but only for explicit reasons, such as spousal abuse or adultery.

Since the legislation was unveiled at an open house of the conservative think tank Sutherland Institute in December, Wallace has fielded dozens of calls and e-mails from Utahns. Some were outraged about her idea, while others suggested their own changes to state divorce statutes. A hefty fiscal note of nearly $1 million in estimated additional court costs also weighed the bill down.

Tuesday, the lawmaker, who never has been married, introduced a substitute bill establishing a "Divorce Task Force." The group would consider expanding grounds for divorce, including "pornography in the home with minors."

Task force members also would review divorce waiting periods and the fees charged for filing divorce papers. Wallace says state courts may be "subsidizing" the cost of divorce: Utah spends $2.7 million handling divorce cases, but collects just $690,000 in fees. Divorcing couples pay about $90 in court filing fees.

Should Divorce Be This Easy?

Excepts below, full article available at OpinionEditorials.com

Should Divorce Be This Easy?
Nathan Tabor

But frankly, the real threat to traditional marriage in America does not lie with the future social change agenda of the homosexuals. This column isn’t about gay marriage, or even about homosexuals. This is about the demise of traditional marriage — and that occurred more than three decades ago with the advent of “No-Fault Divorce.”

When the no-fault doctrine was established as law in the 1970s, the idea of marriage as a permanent bond became less important. “’Til death do us part” became passé, and divorce rates quickly doubled nationwide.

According to the National Center on Health Statistics, 43 percent of all first marriages now end in divorce within 15 years. Second and later marriages fall apart at an even higher rate. Overall, more than 50 percent of all marriages break up in divorce courts. No-fault divorce is a big problem because there is no longer anything to keep a spouse from simply walking out on a marriage.

Children suffer the most. “Only acts of war and the events of natural disasters are more harmful to a child's psyche than the divorce process,” states the Newsletter of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers.

Honest people know that no-fault divorce has been an unmitigated failure, as Dr. Diane Medved candidly admits in her book, The Case Against Divorce:

“I have to start with a confession: This isn't the book I set out to write .... For example, I started this project believing that people who suffer over an extended period in unhappy marriages ought to get out. . . . I thought that striking down taboos about divorce was another part of the ongoing enlightenment of the women's, civil- rights, and human potential movements of the last twenty-five years. . . . To my utter befuddlement, the extensive research I conducted for this book brought me to one inescapable and irrefutable conclusion: I had been wrong."

We can stop the soaring divorce rate in America by discarding the failed no-fault divorce model and toughening the laws on getting a divorce. Laws proposed in many states say that when a couple has children under 18, they can only get a no-fault divorce if they both consent to it. Specific information is available on the website of Americans for Divorce Reform (www.divorcereform.org).

More states stir against ease of 'no fault' divorce

Excerpts below, full article at the Christian Science Monitor

More states stir against ease of 'no fault' divorce
By Brad Knickerbocker

Georgia and several other states consider whether to lengthen the waiting period before marriages can be legally ended. Elsewhere, a growing movement is under way to promote "collaborative divorce," in which couples agree to settle such issues as child custody and finances without going to court - taking some of the civil war, in theory, out of marital breakups.

In addition, there are a growing number of laws that aren't directly related to the availability of divorce but could affect the instances and impact of failed marriages. Some provide "marriage skills" education in public schools as a way of avoiding divorce; others mandate "custody counseling" for divorce cases involving children.

A bill being considered by the Georgia Legislature would extend the waiting period for divorce from 30 days to four months for couples without children and to six months for couples with children. The waiting period could be waived in cases involving spouse abuse, but parents would have to attend special classes on how divorce affects children.

While several states are moving in the same direction, similar bills have been considered and rejected in some states, including New Hampshire and Colorado. Lawmakers in New York - one of the last states which still do not grant no-fault divorces - are debating the need to make divorce easier. Last month, Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm vetoed bills that would encourage premarital counseling for couples and require counseling for couples with children who seek divorce.

In less complicated cases, advocates say nonadversarial collaborative divorce reduces the emotional and financial cost of legal separation. This involves a team approach - including financial advisers and mental-health professionals as well as lawyers - seeking resolution without a court fight.

This may take a bit longer than a quick no-fault divorce. But it can end up costing much less than a contested divorce, advocates say, and it is especially beneficial for the children in such cases. Some studies indicate that couples who initiate collaborative divorce proceedings are more likely to stay together in the end than those who go to court - perhaps lowering the rate of divorce.

Op Ed on No Fault Divorce

This opinion article is from the Salt Lake Tribune.

For the common good, repeal no-fault divorce law Utah Voices
By Paul T. Mero

My parents divorced when I was 14 years old. Their divorce came one week shy of their 25th wedding anniversary. Never did I hear them argue and only once, toward the end, did I sense that there was any trouble at home.

While I knew they loved me, the whole "divorce thing" was beyond my young boy's comprehension. I simply trusted that my parents knew what they were doing, as tough as it was to be apart as a family. Both of my parents went on to remarry, my dad twice again and my mom once. As time has rolled forward I have had a longing that my parents would one day get back together.

As a young boy when they divorced, I just knew they still loved each other. I still possess a letter written to me by my dad telling me what was about to occur and, even still, how much he loved my mother and how he expected me to love and respect her.

They divorced at a time when "no-fault" laws had swept across the country. As for my parents' situation there was no abuse, no adultery, no abandonment, no fault. My mom decided, no doubt after some long soul-searching and inherent pain with the idea, that she was no longer as happy as she wanted to be in the marriage.

It is very difficult to Monday-morning quarterback such events, let alone jump forward to Saturday-morning quarterbacking this event some 30 years later. But is it beyond the pale for a dependent child to expect that his parents stay married absent some egregious fault? Even further, should it be a matter of public policy to insist that parents stay married until the children are gone, again absent some egregious fault?

Prior to 1970 there were no such things as "irreconcilable differences." Public policy in that day required these couples to otherwise tough it out - that if marital problems existed, absent fault, they should work out their differences as long as dependent children were involved.

The "no-fault revolution" occurred for some very good personal reasons. But public policy is not about what is personal, it is about what is best for the common good, and divorce laws, like marriage laws, are not about personal relationships, they're about preserving families and protecting society from incurring unnecessary burdens.

With over 30 years of no-fault policy under our belts, social science research has made clear that our related high levels of divorce are devastating more of life than simply relationships. The financial costs to society, especially in support of fatherless homes, are dramatic.

When children are involved, why should divorce be easy? Though divorce is always messy and never pleasant, why should our laws needlessly facilitate broken homes?

Utah is a family state. We just passed a constitutional amendment defining and protecting marriage. Perhaps the time has come that we should be consistent in our defense of marriage. Having a bad, unfulfilled, or discontented day, week, month, or year is insufficient reason to tear a family apart. It is time to repeal no-fault divorce in Utah.

By the way, on Oct. 5, 2000, my parents - married 24 years, divorced and separate 28 years - were remarried in our family home. They reclaimed the love they lost to easy divorce.

Paul T. Mero is president of the Sutherland Institute, a state-based public policy group that is proposing legislation for the upcoming session of the Legislature to end no-fault divorce in Utah.

Positions on No Fault Divorce

This links to two views on ending no fault divorce. Both are well thought out and presented, you'll have to decide which best encompasses your feelings. End No-Fault Divorce?

Divorce Reform

This is a wonderful site, headed by an attorney, with a plethora of information about no fault divorce. This attorney, John Crouch, would like to see no fault severely limited (or completely eliminated) and replaced by a form of content based divorce. The site includes statistics, legislation, current laws, facts and news, polls and miscellaneous other relevant content. Divorce Reform Page

No Fault Divorce

This article is about previous and current levels of support for making divorce more difficult. It also discusses long term cohabitating partners in terms of their rights at separation. Washington Times

Georgia, SB 298, No Fault

Last week the Georgia Senate passed a bill that would require a 180 day waiting period (up from 30 day) for couples filing divorce using the no fault standard. This would not apply to divorces in which domestic violence was an issue. It also includes some facts about children from divorced homes and the governments interest in marriage. My question is, if you allow domestic abuse divorces to proceed more quickly, what prevents people from falsely claiming abuse. For a woman, it will both expedite the divorce as well as give her an advantage in a custody determination. ajc.com