Parents have the fundamental right to make decisions regarding the care, custody, and control of their children. The United States Supreme Court recognized a parent’s liberty interest, perhaps one of the oldest, in its decision in Troxel v. Granville [530 U.S. 57 (2000)], a case which struck down a Washington statute granting visitation rights to any person when such visitation was in the best interest of the child. The Court held that the statute unconstitutionally interfered with the parents’ rights to raise their children. In Troxel, the Court applied the presumption that a fit parent necessarily will act in the best interest of the child, and in such case, there would be no need for the state to interfere.
This presumption is at the forefront of a recent case decided by the Texas Supreme Court, In Re C.J.C., a matter involving the modification of a child custody order. The father filed a motion to dismiss the modification proceeding that was filed prior to the death of the child’s mother. The child’s grandparents petitioned to intervene, requesting that they be named joint managing conservators. The mother’s partner with whom she had been living at the time of her death also intervened, seeking the same relief as the grandparents as well as court-ordered visitation. The trial court issued temporary orders naming the mother’s partner a possessory conservator. The father filed a petition for a writ of mandamus, which the appellate court denied. The Texas Supreme Court took up the petition.
The primary issue before the Court was whether the fit parent presumption applied in a child custody modification case. The Court held that “[w]hen a nonparent requests conservatorship or possession of a child, the child’s best interest is embedded with the presumption that it is the fit parent - not the court - who makes the determination whether to allow that request.” Although neither the nonparent standing statute nor the general modification statute includes the fit parent presumption, the Court reasoned that because the modification statute takes into account that the child’s best interest was determined in the original custody proceeding, that determination necessarily includes the fit-parent presumption. Thus, the father was entitled to a presumption that he determined the child’s “best interest based on his fundamental right as a fit parent.”
