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The Judicial Resolution of Disputes Involving Children and Religion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 January 2008

S. E. Mumford
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Extract

Within the past few years, the English Court of Appeal has ruled in a variety of cases involving disputes about the religious upbringing of children following the separation or divorce of their parents. Many of these cases have not been reported, although the most significant of them, Re R, is well known to family lawyers. In other jurisdictions the European Court of Human Rights in Hoffmann and the Supreme Court of Canada in Young and D.P. v. C.S. have also heard important cases in which a significant factor before the court was the influence of religious beliefs and practices on the children of those who professed them. This article is the result of a study of these and other cases from England, the United States and Canada in order to investigate the reasoning and the trends in judicial decision-making in cases involving children and religion.

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Article
Information
International & Comparative Law Quarterly , Volume 47 , Issue 1 , January 1998 , pp. 117 - 148
Copyright
Copyright © British Institute of International and Comparative Law 1998

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References

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101. Goldstein et al. idem. p.38. would permit even this.

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107. Supra n.105. at p.45.Google Scholar

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110. Wallerstein, J. S. and Kelly, J. B.. Surviving the Break-up (1980). p.215Google Scholar: Hetherington, E. M.. Cox, M. and Cox, R., “Divorced Fathers” (1976) 25 The Family Co-ordinator 417–428.Google ScholarHowever. Furstenberg, F. F. and Cherlin, A. J. allege that more recent observational studies have not found the same correlation: Divided Families (1981). p.72.Google Scholar

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114. Ibid.

115. The Times, 12 Feb. 1997.Google Scholar

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119. Or those held by the liberally minded “elite” of judges and legislators. Mary Ann Glendon suggests there may be a disparity between the views of this group and those of the majority concerning the relative importance of the freedom of religion: “Religion and the Court; A New Beginning?”, in Eastland, T. (Ed.), Religious Liberty in the Supreme Court (1983), p.471.Google Scholar

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136. This term is used in contrast to that of “significant harm” criticised by Carolyn Hamilton, op. cit. supra n.49, at p.214, as unduly favouring parents' rights at the expense of their children.Google Scholar

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