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21 J. Am. Acad. Matrimonial Law. 43 (2008)
Collaborative Reproduction and Rethinking Parentage

handle is hein.journals/jaaml21 and id is 49 raw text is: Vol. 21, 2008 Collaborative Reproduction and Parentage 43 Collaborative Reproduction and Rethinking Parentage by Charles P. Kindregan, Jr* I. Introduction By the middle of the twentieth century, issues of legal parenthood were well settled in American law; in the first decade of the twenty-first century, those issues are hardly settled at all. How did this happen, and how does it impact family law today? This article explores some developing aspects of these questions. In the not-very-distant past, the question of who is a legal father and who is a legal mother could be answered easily. A woman who gave birth was the mother. If she was married, her husband was presumed to be the father, and the circumstances in which this presumption could be rebutted were very narrow. If the birth mother was unmarried, she was the only parent until a male either acknowledged paternity or was determined to be the father in a court of law. If a child was adopted after its birth, the adoptive parents were the legal parents. In this idealized world, issues of parentage rarely arose in divorce litigation, and there were no cryopreservation banks containing embryos of doubtful legal status. Those realities have now changed, and the result is that in the absence of controlling legislation,1 the courts must struggle to answer this question: Who is a parent? This article will discuss * Charles P. Kindregan, Jr., is Distinguished Professor of Law at Suffolk University's Law School in Boston, where he teaches Family Law. The author gratefully acknowledges the research assistance of Jessica Grasso. 1 The A.B.A. Family Law Section Committee on Assisted Reproduction and Genetics, chaired by the author of this article, drafted a comprehensive model act on assisted reproduction which was approved by the Family Law Sec- tion Council in February, 2007, and by the A.B.A. House of delegates in Febru- ary, 2008, and which could serve as a legislative model. The Uniform Parentage Act (2000), 9B U.L.A. 295 (2001 & Supp. 2006), as amended in 2002, deals with some parentage issues relevant to this Article and will be cited in context below.

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