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That sounds odd for IL. They seriously tightened their grandparent visitation laws in 2004, after the IL Supreme Court struck down the original laws as facially unconstitutional in three different gpv cases. Giving third party, non-relatives visitation would directly contradict Troxel, and the laws were specifically rewritten to conform to Troxel.Quote:
Quoting Dogmatique
Note, this is not grandparent visitation law. It's the separate question of when a third party can have a sufficient relationship with the child to seek custody.Quote:
Although visitation is not transferable from a parent to another person, under certain circumstances the common law permits a non-custodial parent to ask the court to permit his or her family to have visitation with the child when the parent is not able to.
In re M.M.D., 344 Ill.App.3d 345, 279 Ill.Dec. 543, 800 N.E.2d 831 (2003), from the Illinois Second Circuit. However, other Illinois appellate circuits did not follow its lead in finding a common law action for grandparent visitation. See, e.g., In re Marriage of Ross, 355 Ill. App.3d 1162, 1169-70, 291 Ill.Dec. 858, 824 N.E.2d 1108 (2005); Beurksen v. Graff, 351 Ill.App.3d 148, 150, 286 Ill.Dec. 325, 813 N.E.2d 1018 (2004); Langman v. Langman, 325 Ill.App.3d 101, 107-08, 258 Ill.Dec. 816, 757 N.E.2d 505 (2001). I haven't looked into subsequent legislation or thoroughly looked for subsequent appellate treatment that might indicate whether the state's supreme court has resolved the conflict.Quote:
In one famous case, the mother died in childbirth and the baby lived with the maternal grandparents for the first five years. The father was then awarded custody and he sought to keep the child from the maternal grandparents. The grandparents went to court – without using the grandparents’ visitation law – and were awarded visitation with the child based on common law principles.