Family law

Family law is an area that deals with all legal issues related to family relationships, such as adoption, divorce and child custody. Attorneys who practice family law are usually responsible for separating spouses, determining who will get child custody, child support, and other related legal issues. Some family law attorneys specialize in adoption, paternity, emancipation, or other matters not usually related to divorce but including family. States have the right to determine the requirements for marriage, including age and legal capacity. At the same time, attorneys who practice family law are regulated by state laws that establish the rules and procedures for divorce and other family matters.

Related topics

Agricultural law, law merchant, natural law, positive law, public law, roman law, social law

What is family law?

Family law is the part of civil law that has as its objective legal-family aspects such as matrimonial relations and paternity, including personal aspects, patrimonial and guardianship, and whose main axis is the family, filiation and marriage.

About family law

Family law consists of a set of statutes and precedents that govern the legal responsibilities between individuals who share a domestic connection. They usually involve people who are related by blood or marriage, but family law can also affect those in more distant or casual relationships other than spouses. Most processes involving family law occur as a result of marriage termination or a romantic relationship.

Family law attorneys help clients apply for separation or divorce, alimony, and child custody. Family law also involves the prevention of physical and emotional abuse, and this is another area that includes family law. In this case domestic abuse is not limited to relationships between spouses and their children, so judges will not hesitate to assert jurisdiction to protect an elderly family member.

Characteristics

Its main features are as follows:

• It has a broad moral or ethical
• The social interest prevails over the people’ interest.
• Its norms are included in the public order, so they are imperative and unavailable.
• The autonomy principle of the will does not apply in matters related to family law.
• For family law the word community implies parents, children, and some people who are attached to them with the bond of affection, blood or law.
• There is a connection between family law institutions and the marital status of individuals.
• It is responsible for regulating relations equally and granting hierarchies.

Legal nature of family law

The word juridical nature is the term from which derive the situations that allow us to determine the juridical branch to which the subjects under study belong in order to determine their obligations and rights. It means, to give a place within the law science to the contract, the institution or the situation of which we refer. Family law has traditionally been considered as a part of civil law, under private law. It has its own nature and its content is neither private nor civil. It is a new branch of law with its own characteristics and its own objective: the family, which is governed by public order rules, different from those of the State and promulgated by it.

Backgrounds

Most of the changes made to family law at the end of the twentieth century have been based on marriage concepts, family and gender, themes that go back to European feudalism, church law and period customs. During the Anglo-Saxon era in England, marriage and divorce were private matters. However, after the Norman conquest in 1066, the legal status of a married woman was established by the Common Law, and the Canon Law, which prescribed various rights and duties.

The result was that the identity of the wife merged with that of the husband; he was a legal person, but she was not. After marriage, the husband received the property of all the wife and took over all the property she owned. In return, the husband was obligated to support the wife and her children.

History of family law

Firstly, the family group was based on sexual relations between the inhabitants of a tribe, the oldest origin of the family was matriarchal, as the children only knew who their mother was. Then, in the old age, marriages were given by groups and the first restriction is given to join freely. The consanguineous family is the first taboo on the sex trade that gives rise to the family.

The Punulúa family established the prohibition to have relations between uterine siblings reaching even the cousins. The syndiasmic family restricted sexual freedom because the spouses had to maintain relations only between them and both were in charge of children. The total evolution of the family takes place in the middle age, where monogamy is established, with children completing family nucleus.

Aims

The purposes of family law are based on the survival, permanence and continuity of the family, seeking the way to perpetuate the species and protect it, and at the same time, to give the necessary protection to all the family members that make up the family nucleus.

Importance of family law

Family law is important because it is responsible for safeguarding and protecting a family’s patrimony by setting standards for them. It provides protection to all family members and sets out the obligations, duties and rights of the persons in the family.

Examples

Some examples of family law are the following:

• Equal rights for children.
• The right to decide on the number of children.
• The mother’s right to legal protection and social security.
• Protection against family abuse.
• Protection in case of marriage abandonment.