Source: Bill Wood:

 

These Constitutional questions are raised for decision by this Court and are both pivotal and fundamental to the matters before this court.  These questions raise matters of such paramount import directly hinging on this entire process, procedure, adjudication, litigation, the parties, and the legal system itself that they must be addressed before any adjudication can begin. 

 

These questions create the guiding framework for the custody adjudication in this matter.  Until these pivotal Constitutional questions are answered, the custody determination can not be reached, as the determination of custody hinges upon the Constitutional liberties, freedoms, and interests raised by these questions.

 

"States are not free to avoid constitutional issues on inadequate state grounds, they [are being] given the first opportunity to consider them” O'Connor v. Ohio, 385 U.S. 92 (1966).  Should the state decline to rule on the issue, at any level of the proceedings, the state is then removed from consideration and jurisdiction may be immediately conferred upon the Federal Courts to instruct the state(s) on the appropriate answers or course of action, pursuant to jurisdiction under 28 USC 1331, and removal under 28 USC 1441, et. seq.  Further, each and every Constitutional issue raised for consideration in this court must be decided or passed over.  In passing, it [they] is [are] clearly available for appropriate legal and public review as our Republican form of government Constitutionally dictates.  In ignoring or passing on ANY of these Constitutional questions, the court satisfies the third and final prong of the Younger abstention doctrine (Pursuant to Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 1973 [pertaining to pending state criminal matters] and Middlesex County Ethics Comm. v. Garden State Bar Ass'n., 457 U.S. 423 (1982) [taking Younger principles and applying them to pending civil litigation].

 

1.                  Are parental rights constitutionally protected fundamental liberty interests?

2.                  Are [parents] constitutionally protected liberty interests inclusive of the parents right to the care, custody, management and companionship of [his or her] minor children?

3.                  Are these constitutionally protected fundamental parental rights a “settled principle,” and in fact a well-established principle of constitutional law?

4.                  Does the “free-ranging best interests of the child” determination give insufficient protection to the parent's constitutional right to raise the child without undue intervention by the state?

5.                  Do parents have a constitutional right to determine, without undue interference by the state, how best to raise, nurture, and educate the child?

6.                  Is the state prohibited from depriving any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law?

7.                  Must any denial of Due Process be tested by the “totality of the facts”?

8.                  Must the court be vigilant to scrutinize the attendant facts with an eye to detect and a hand to prevent violations of the Constitution by circuitous and indirect methods?

9.                  Is any law impinging on an individual’s fundamental rights, subject to strict scrutiny?  If not, what is the appropriate level of scrutiny for fundamental rights?

10.              In order to withstand strict scrutiny, must the law advance a compelling state interest by the least restrictive means available?  And if so, what is the least restrictive means available in custody determinations between two fit parents?

11.              Having been repeatedly affirmed that the parent-child relationship is an important interest warranting deference and, absent a powerful countervailing interest, protection, what is the states powerful countervailing (or compelling) interest in a less than equal custody determination for two fit parents?

12.              How does the Ninth Amendment’s construction, that certain rights retained by the people shall not be denied or disparaged, apply to fundamental parental rights?

13.              How does this court prevent denying or disparaging fundamental parental rights under the “free-ranging best interests of the child” determination, absent clearly enumerated criteria and standards for adjudication?

14.              Does the “free-ranging best interests of the child” determination violate Due Process by being “overly broad, vague, or general”?

15.              Do the Courts have an obligation, duty, or responsibility to determine constructions and interpretations of the Constitution through the looking glass of the preamble where it states its purpose is “a more perfect union, … [to] establish justice, … [to] insure domestic tranquility, … [to] promote the general welfare, … [and to] secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity”? 

16.              How does separating a fit parent from a child’s life in custody proceedings (almost universally the father) promote “a more perfect union, … establish justice, …  insure domestic tranquility, … promote the general welfare, … [and] secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity”?