Re: The ‘pre-pre-precautionary’ eradication of the American father in family court

To the editor,

First of all, let me wish a happy belated Father’s Day weekend to all the dads out there. Truly, I hope you enjoyed the weekend. Because if you find yourself caught in the gears of the family court system right now, “happy” is the absolute last word you’ll be using.

Here’s the setup: Parent A walks into a courtroom and says, “He drinks too much.” Or, “He’s crazy.” No proof. No drug test. No nothing. And what does the court do? Do they say, “Hey, let’s get a quick test and see what’s what?” No! They can instantly suspend the father’s custody access. Boom. Done. Gone. They call it a “temporary safety measure.” Temporary! You know what temporary means in family court? A year. It’s an administrative black hole.

Why a year? Because the court’s official list of Observe and Evaluate Mental Health Professionals and forensic evaluators is entirely depleted. There’s nobody available! It’s a ghost town. So a dad is told, “We just need a quick evaluation, and then we’ll sort this out.” Great! Except the provider who does the evaluation has a waiting list longer than the line at a trendy brunch spot on Sunday morning. Meanwhile, the clock is ticking, the months are passing, and a fundamental constitutional right to be a parent is being completely obliterated without a timely investigation or a proper hearing. It’s insane!

The Supreme Court of the United States explicitly laid it out in Troxel v. Granville: the right of a parent to raise their child is a fundamental liberty interest protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. It’s a big deal. It’s the oldest fundamental liberty interest we have! But apparently, the family court system didn’t get the memo. Instead of protecting this right, the state flips the whole concept of justice on its head. You are guilty until proven innocent, and good luck proving your innocence when the system won’t even give you the test to do it!

In the vast majority of these cases, fathers are being systematically erased as parents. The court thinks it’s solving a problem, but the harm of not letting a child see their father for over a year is infinitely greater than the unverified, hypothetical risk they are trying to fix in the first place. The remedy is completely killing the patient!

Let’s look at this from a Jewish perspective for a second. The Torah has a very famous, very direct commandment right there in the Top Ten: “Honor thy father and thy mother” (Exodus 20:12). Notice it says honor thy father AND thy mother. It does not say “honor only thy mother.” It doesn’t say “honor thy mother, and maybe the father if he passes a year-long bureaucratic obstacle course.” It’s an equal partnership! When the court lets one parent use administrative gridlock to completely sever that bond, you know what that is? It’s stealing. Plain and simple. It’s a double theft: stealing a child from a father, and stealing a father from a child. It’s a moral disaster.

If we keep going down this road, what do we think is going to happen to these kids? You can’t just pluck a father out of a child’s life for a year based on a whim and expect them to turn out totally fine. It doesn’t work that way! We are actively manufacturing an entire generation of children who will have significant, deep-seated mental health issues. Anxiety, depression, attachment issues — you name it, they’ll have it. And all because the system can’t handle basic logistics.

The courts cannot solve this problem alone; they need the legislature to wake up, step in, and fix the plumbing. We need four immediate overhauls:

Mandatory immediate testing: If someone makes an allegation involving substances, test the accused parent within 48 to 72 hours. Immediately! Verify first, suspend later.

Strict 30-day time limits: If you absolutely must restrict access on an emergency basis, a full evidentiary hearing must happen within 30 days. No more indefinite ‘temporary’ orders.

Fund the mental health panels: The legislature needs to provide real funding to increase pay for court-appointed MHPs and forensic evaluators so we actually have enough providers to service the community.

Use common-sense tech safeguards: Instead of defaulting to zero contact, use remote alcohol monitoring or secure video calls. Keep the bond alive while the red tape clears.

We cannot keep tolerating a system that erases fathers by default just because the logistics are inconvenient. Parenthood is a sacred right — protected by the Constitution, demanded by the Torah, and essential for a child’s brain. Let’s get the legislature to fund the courts, enforce due process and let fathers actually be fathers.

JULIE HYMAN, ESQ.
Principal Attorney,
Julie Hyman, PC