Earlier this year, Public Policy Polling conducted a survey of 580 Old Line State voters regarding their attitudes toward shared parenting and Maryland law on child custody.

A whopping 79 percent of respondents said they thought fathers and mothers should receive equal treatment by family courts in child custody decisions.

Additionally, 63 percent said they favored changing state law to “create a starting point whereby joint legal and physical custody – commonly referred to as shared parenting – for approximately equal periods of time is viewed as being in the best interests of the child.” Only 15 percent said they opposed such a change.

Not only that, but support for a change in the law crossed all boundaries of gender, race and political persuasion. Substantial majorities of men and women, Republicans and Democrats, whites, African-Americans and other races support reform of child custody laws. By any definition, that’s a landslide victory for shared parenting.

That’s right in line with similar surveys in Canada and the United Kingdom that consistently find 70 to 80 percent of respondents favoring shared parenting.

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A new survey of Maryland voters reveals overwhelming support for shared parenting following divorce.

Earlier this year, Public Policy Polling conducted a survey of 580 Old Line State voters regarding their attitudes toward shared parenting and Maryland law on child custody.

A whopping 79% of respondents said they thought fathers and mothers should receive equal treatment by family courts in child custody decisions.

Additionally, 63% said they favored changing state law to “create a starting point whereby joint legal and physical custody – commonly referred to as shared parenting – for approximately equal periods of time is viewed as being in the best interests of the child.” Only 15% said they opposed such a change.

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The confluence of social science and the wisdom of everyday people has resulted in wave after wave of shared parenting bills before state legislatures. This year alone, some 20 states considered – and three passed –  shared parenting bills.

But despite the studies backing shared parenting and its widespread popular support, Maryland law on child custody is among the worst in the nation. In 2014, when National Parents Organization, the country’s largest organization promoting the benefits of shared parenting, graded each state’s custody law, Maryland’s scored a dismal D -.

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During Military Family Appreciation Month, National Parents Organization joins the rest of the nation to express gratitude to our military families for their service and sacrifice. While deployment is certainly challenging enough on its own, that stress can increase drastically when military parents are also dealing with child custody battles following a divorce or separation. National Parents Organization believes an additional way to provide support and appreciation for military families is not to make child custody decisions while a parent is deployed.

“The child development research is now crystal clear that children do best when their loving bonds with each parent are protected after parents separate or divorce,” says Ned Holstein, MD, founder of National Parents Organization. “Unfortunately, some active duty service members have found that the custody of their children has been changed in important ways while they were serving their country overseas and unable to be present in family court. Sometimes when they return from overseas duty, they cannot even find their children.”

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During Military Family Appreciation Month, National Parents Organization has joined the rest of the nation to express gratitude to our military families for their service and sacrifice. While deployment is certainly challenging enough on its own, that stress can increase drastically when military parents are also dealing with child custody battles following a divorce or separation. National Parents Organization believes an additional way to provide support and appreciation for military families is not to make child custody decisions while a parent is deployed.

“The child development research is now crystal clear that children do best when their loving bonds with each parent are protected after parents separate or divorce,” says Ned Holstein, MD, founder of National Parents Organization. “Unfortunately, some active duty service members have found that the custody of their children has been changed in important ways while they were serving their country overseas and unable to be present in family court. Sometimes when they return from overseas duty, they cannot even find their children.”

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While deployment is certainly challenging enough on its own, that stress can increase drastically when military parents are also dealing with child custody battles, especially if one of the parents is deployed far away.

An additional way to provide support and appreciation for military families is through shared parenting rights, regardless of whether a parent is deployed.

Shared parenting is a flexible arrangement in which children spend as close to equal time with each parent as possible following a divorce or separation, and is appropriate if there has been no domestic violence and both parents are fit. A growing body of research has shown that shared parenting is in the best interests of children, even those who are very young. Children who have meaningful contact with both parents are shown to be happier and healthier and do better in school than kids raised by single parents in traditional custody arrangements.

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Parents are about to find out if they have protected constitutional rights in divorce and whether the Texas family code violates those rights.

Ron and Sherry Palmer accomplished what attorneys told them would be impossible, the Eastern District Federal Court accepted their brief on Thursday, February 25, 2016, that cites their family court judges ignore parental rights and children’s rights and that the Texas family code violates the constitutional rights of parents and children, in Palmer et al v. Paxton Jr., et al,. Parents and attorneys had not been able to be heard by the federal courts on these constitutional violations before this, told instead they were barred by numerous abstention doctrines like Rooker-Feldman, Pullman, and Younger.

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National Parents Organization recognizes the goals of the National Domestic Violence Awareness Month year-round by raising awareness of the tragic impact domestic violence has on many families throughout the nation. As President Obama has said, domestic violence impacts “women, men, and children of every age, background, and belief.”

National Parents Organization will continue to support shared parenting (50/50 custody) when parents divorce or separate only in cases where domestic violence is not an issue. The organization’s leadership urges others to also join in the fight against domestic violence by supporting shared parenting.

International experts have concluded that shared parenting can help reduce domestic violence. At the 2015 International Conference on Shared Parenting, which included about 120 research scientists and other experts from more than 20 countries, participants concluded that “…shared parenting [after parental separation or divorce] is recognized as the most effective means for both reducing high parental conflict and preventing first-time family violence.”

This is in stark contrast to the practices of most family courts in the Unites States, which have assumed that shared parenting between high conflict parents after separation or divorce is dangerous and should not be tried. National Parents Organization is pleased that a handful of states — including Missouri, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Minnesota, and South Dakota — have implemented laws that encourage shared parenting. More than 20 states have considered similar proposals in the last year.

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Being a single parent can be a cognitive tax for very many parents and for a variety of reasons. Most people who have children have them with a partner or a spouse. It is no doubt easier to have two (or more) people raise kids together than being all alone and doing everything from pickups and snow or hurricane days to spending seventeen hours in the ER on a weeknight.

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