A Walk by Faith: Founding Stories of the Law School

This Founders Day address was given to the J. Reuben Clark Law Society at Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City on August 30, 2007

Professionalism

This address was given to the charter class of the BYU Law School on August 30, 1973 (four days after the first opening of the school)

Children\u27s Liberation and the New Egalitarianism: Some Reservations About Abandoning Youth to Their Rights

After the type for this article had been set, the US. Supreme Court decided two cases having potential implications for the constitutional rights of minors-Bellotti v. Baird, 44 US. L. W. 5221 (July 1, 1976) and Planned Parenthood of Central Missouri v. Danforth, 44 U.S.L. W. 5197 (July 1, 1976). In Belloti, a unanimous Court held that the lower federal court should have abstained from determining the constitutionality of a state statute requiring parental consent to an unmarried minor\u27s abortion but providing for judicial order of consent for good cause shown after parental consent is refused. The Court found the statute susceptible of an interpretation by the appropriate state court that would not impose an absolute \u27parental veto power. Because such an interpretation would avoid or substantially modify the federal constitutional challenge to the statute, abstention was held to be appropriate. The Planned Parenthood case struck down a state statute imposing an absolute parental veto power over minors\u27 abortion decisions; however, the majority opinion represented the views of only three of the nine Justices. There were four dissenters and the concurring opinion by Justice Stewart (joined by Justice Powell) implied that a statutory imposition of parental consent or consultation requirements short of an unconditional veto (such as the Belloti statute might be) could well be constitutionally permissible. The meaning of these decisions is unclear because of the uncertainty created by such a split among the members of the Court and the variety of potential approaches to parental consent requirements short of an absolute veto power. However, some of the language in Mr. Justice Blackmun\u27s majority opinion in Planned Parenthood, while representing the views of but one-third of the Court, illustrates the serious lack of perspective on children\u27s rights issues already reflected in a variety of lower court decisions and in other literature. It is that lack of perspective that gave rise to this article

The Constitutional Status of Marriage, Kinship, and Sexual Privacy -- Balancing the Individual and Social Interests

Today\u27s lopsided competition between the individual and social interests has made the law a party to the contemporary haze that clouds our vision of what a family is or should be. In that sense, recent legal developments have contributed to the crisis Stanley Hauerwas has identified regarding American family life today - our inability to define what kind of family should exist and our inability to articulate \u27\u27why we should think of [the family] as our most basic moral institution. In response to those two questions, this Article considers whether, as a constitutional matter, the courts should recognize claims by unrelated individuals or groups who seek the same legal protection as that given to formal relationships based on legal marriage or kinship