Legal Intern Protecting Parental Rights

 

This guest post is from Alejandro Cevallos, Regent Law 3L:

 

This past summer I clerked for the Pacific Justice Institute (PJI) in Sacramento, CA. I had the distinct honor to report directly to the Chief Counsel. Although most of PJI's high profile cases are related to religious liberty PJI also specializes in parental rights.

PJI regularly hosts town hall meetings educating communities about the law of the state when it comes to children and how to be prepared to avoid state entanglement. In fact, one example that comes to mind is a situation the PJI President dealt with as a young litigator. He had a client who took their newborn baby to a clinic to get a diagnosis for the baby's lack of weight gain. The doctor concluded that the baby was not being fed enough. As a result, the client was reported to the Child Protection Services (CPS) and their baby was eventually taken away from their family. A Christian friend of the parents of the baby felt like the parents needed to get a second opinion. Therefore, the state allowed another doctor to check on the baby and it turned out the baby had a special condition not caused by the parent; indeed, they did not neglect to feed their child. The CPS state representative felt the second opinion, which came from a doctor through their Church, was invalid, and the parents were separated from their newborn baby for nearly a year. PJI stepped in to help this family regain custody of their baby, and a court found that the first eager young clinic doctor rushed to the wrong conclusions. 

PJI might make the headlines with religious liberty cases, but their assistance in parental rights are equally important.  The state of California and the 9th Circuit of the Federal Courts (where most of PJI's clientele come from) have social norms that protect children who identify as LGBQT. Parents are told they will be visited by social workers when they have a child who identifies as gay, transexual, lesbian, queer, or bisexual. Many parents (Christian or not) want to work with the social workers to do everything in their power to help their child. However, state law and the 9th circuit rulings make it very hard for parents to do so. Social workers have a lot of power in what they say in their reports. A parent’s help to his or her child with conversion therapy may be reported as child abuse. PJI informs and educates parents on wise communication with social workers.

The heart of PJI is for families to stay together. The last thing PJI wants is for a newborn baby to be taken away from their natural parents over something that could have been avoided, or losing a child to foster care simply because they are confused about their sexual orientation. PJI makes the extra effort to educate the community. Family is the foundation of a strong nation and PJI applies biblical principles in real time to preserve family unity.