Shared custody law is followed by other states
The Wall Street Journal reports that the divorce rate in Kentucky has dropped by a quarter since a law establishing 50% shared child custody as the standard was introduced in 2018.
Four other states – Arkansas, West Virginia, Florida and Missouri – have since passed their own versions of Kentucky’s custody bill.
Around 20 others are close to passing similar laws, according to an analysis by the National Parents Organisation.
The law has become a model for other states, not least because Kentucky’s divorce rate has dropped, the WSJ states.
Between 2016 and 2023 the divorce rate fell 25%, compared with a nationwide decline of 18%, according to an analysis by the National Center for Family & Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University.
The Kentucky legislation, which was hailed by men’s rights campaigners, has also been controversial for child-safety reasons, the newspaper reports.
Research suggests that the legal presumption of shared custody has led some couples to stay together.
Division of custody
The legislation presumes division of custody, giving both parents equal rights and responsibilities, except in documented cases of abuse or danger to the children.
Previously, some fathers in Kentucky had complained of being relegated to a marginal role in their children’s lives.
Legislators said that the law could lead to better co-operation between ex-spouses, with mediated conflict resolution.
However, social workers have said that child and parental safety may be at risk in cases of domestic abuse.
Experts state that the law must be applied with caution, with exceptions and safeguards for high-risk cases.
Feelings of abandonment
Fathers’ rights campaigners said dividing time and decision-making equally between parents reduced feelings of abandonment in children, and lowered tensions, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Bowling Green family-and-marriage centre assistant director Krista Westrick-Payne explained that the divorce rate typically went down when couples believed the costs of leaving outweighed the benefits.
Some people are staying married to abusive partners, critics of the law say, because they fear leaving their children alone with a parent with a history of violence.
Domestic-violence campaigners say the law may put children in harm’s way, and that judges are wary of trampling on parental rights, which places a burden on anyone trying to prove that a fellow parent is abusive or that splitting custody evenly is not in the best interest of the children.
Matt Hale, vice chair of the National Parents Organisation, who wrote the first draft of the shared-custody legislation, told the WSJ: “There are lots of safeguards in Kentucky’s law that protect children from being placed in a dangerous situation.”
Presumption overturned
If one parent was subject to a domestic-violence order, the presumption of 50-50 custody was automatically overturned, he said.
Emma Johnson, a divorced, shared-parenting advocate and author of The 50/50 Solution told the WSJ that she believed her children were best served by spending as much time with their father as they did with her.
Johnson argues that the expectation that kids belong with their mothers holds women back.
Mica Wood Pence, a family-court judge in Kentucky, said that law was meant to be a helpful starting point, not an order to be followed blindly.
The amended law reads: “The court will start with the assumption that both parents should have equal rights and responsibilities regarding their child’s upbringing.”
The judge had hoped for this arrangement while representing fathers as a family lawyer before going on the bench in 2018.
Worst circumstances
“There are always going to be concerns,” said Pence.
“The way to counter concerns is not to make bad laws for everyone else. You can’t set up laws for all families that are based upon the worst circumstances.”
Kentucky’s legislature also recently decided that parents who spent more time caring for their children should pay less in child support.
“A big concern with this law is that a lot of dads are going to say they want 50-50 custody, when what they really want is to reduce their child support,” said Ralph Richard Banks, a family-law professor at Stanford told the WSJ.