Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645 (1972)
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Description
In Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645 (1972), the state agency responsible for ensuring children's safety and well-being took Peter Stanley's children into custody after learning that their mother had died. Stanley was the children's biological father who, along with their mother, raised the children over an eighteen year period. However, the parents never married, and Illinois law did not recognize fathers of children born out of wedlock as parents with enforceable rights unless the father married the children's mother or secured a court order of paternity. Since Stanley had done neither, Illinois law refused to recognize him as the children's father and proceeded as if the children were orphans. After the Illinois courts declared Stanley's children to be state wards, Stanley appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States. In a landmark decision written for the majority by Justice Byron White, the Court held that Illinois violated Stanley's rights to equal protection of the law by treating him differently than it would have treated the children's mother. The Court held that, at least when they raise their children, fathers of children born out of wedlock must be treated the same way the children's mother would be treated. This was the first time the Supreme Court held that “unwed fathers” had constitutionally protected rights. Prior to this point, virtually all states ignored such fathers and recognized only mothers as legal parents of such children. But the facts of the case made it relatively easy for Stanley to prevail in the Supreme Court because he did much more than sire his children. An important question, which subsequent cases were needed to answer, is whether the U.S. Constitution requires that fathers always be treated as mothers would be or whether it is permissible to distinguish between unwed mothers and unwed fathers based on the relationship they maintain with their children after the children's birth.
Source Publication
Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States
Source Editors/Authors
David S. Tanenhaus
Publication Date
2008
Volume Number
4: P—S
Recommended Citation
Guggenheim, Martin, "Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645 (1972)" (2008). Faculty Chapters. 1265.
https://gretchen.law.nyu.edu/fac-chapt/1265
