Throughout the country, including in Georgia, there are groups that are lobbying state legislatures for passage of laws that will make it mandatory for shared custody or joint custody arrangements to be ordered by the courts.
A technical glitch with their blog prevented comments from being accepted to be posted. I emailed my post in but didn't get a reply. Unfortunately my original response was lost, but I basically said this:
You write that "there are groups that are lobbying state legislatures for passage of laws that will make it mandatory for shared custody or joint custody arrangements to be ordered by the courts."
I study these issues and know of no such group that is seeking that shared or joint custody be mandatory or required. Who would argue that, irrespective of any circumstances, some custody arrangement be mandatory, that a judge must order that custody arrangement (irrespective of the judge's judgment about the case)?? Nobody. If you can point to any people or groups who actually seek this, please let me know, since I believe there are no such people or organizations.
Rather, people and organizations seek a shared parenting presumption, which is entirely different from a 'mandate.' They argue that equality -- that is, equal physical and legal custody -- should be the standard or starting point: the ‘burden of proof’ is on anyone seeking a non-equal custody arrangement.
I hope that your readers, clients and potential clients will appreciate this correction concerning what advocates for shared or equal parenting actual argue for.
This is the second instance that I've seen of an attorney claiming that people organizations advocate for a shared parenting mandate, when none of them do. I wonder what's the motivation for this misunderstanding or misrepresentation.
