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May 27, 2005

Exploration: Joining the Opposition?

[NOTE: This document was added to the blog on September 6, 2005]

I. MAYBE YL'S IDEOLOGY HAS FLAWS THAT NEED FIXING

I am currently deep in the midst of research, guided by this question: "What are the origins of artificial age lines?" The research is becoming very expansive, spanning from the time of Hammurabi (ca. 1700 BCE) to the present day, 2005 AD. Currently, I am at a stage where I'm skimming books and articles quickly, experimenting with skeletons that will presumably get fleshed out later.

Today I discovered the "Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood: In History and Society" (2004. Paula S. Fass, Editor in Chief. To be referred to as ECC from here on.). In the section titled "Law, Children and the", there's an illuminating account of minors' legal status from the time of the thirteen colonies to the present day. One interesting point was that there has been a backlash towards Children's Rights gaining in strength since a high water mark around 1970. The essence of this backlash seems to bee opposition to the notion that youth should be granted the full set of adult rights.

Curious about what directions the backlash has taken, I pulled out "In Their Best Interest? The Case Against Equal Rights for Children" (1992. Laura M. Purdy.) To my surprise, Laura M. Purdy is a feminist philosopher. I've had this book on my shelf for some time -- it was obvious that I had to own it -- but I haven't gotten around to reading it, partly because I expected it to come from a religious conservative perspective. My sense now, after a brief skim, is that Purdy is against YL as it has been articulated by Howard Cohen, Richard Farson, and John Holt -- but she is nonetheless in favor of getting rid of many of the obviously unjustified expressions of adult authority (e.g. dress codes, censoring reading material). Furthermore, her analysis is adequately in-line with my own values, that I'm prone to look at her book as a contribution towards improving the YL movement, rather than as the work of an enemy.

The ECC entry says:

"[A]ge-blind" rights became the goal of children's rights advocates, who argued that children should have the same rights as adults. Indeed, some even called for the abolition of minority status, which was likened to slavery and coverture." (p. 545)

I think this is a fairly accurate description of Cohen, Farson, and Holt's work -- as well as most of my own... However, the key phrase here that the backlash objects to is "the same rights as adults". Me, for some time now I've been going in a different direction from "equality" as it's been traditionally understood -- and I think perhaps it's time for me to hash through some of the fundamental differences between myself and these seminal authors, whom I've been so inspired by.

II. YL'S BIGGEST PROBLEM: "THE SAME RIGHTS AS ADULTS" ALONE ISN'T ENOUGH

The crucial difference, perhaps, is that I don't think YL can afford to interpret "equal rights" as "identical rights". Instead, I think that we need to (1) recognize differences, (2) create accommodations for young people's actual disabilities, and thus (3) transform how we understand both adulthood and childhood.

To an extent, the YL movement should consider the civil rights movement of adults with disabilities our implicit ally. A premise of their cause is that people are not physically and mentally identical -- but by modifying the physical environment and institutional structures of society, the playing field can be leveled so that they can enjoy something like "equal rights". I do want an "age-blind" society -- but it is absurd to think that we could simply stop paying attention to the special needs of five-year-olds. We must change the practical arrangements of living: then age differences can begin to gently fade away on their own.

The strongest current incarnation of YL, the Youth Rights movement, seems to take it's inspiration from the civil rights movements of blacks and women in the fifties, sixties, and seventies. What I sense the YR activists may not be fully aware of, however, is that "equality" has been a problematic concept when it's been applied to women. Of the top of my head, I know of two books that deal with feminism's struggle with "equality": "Feminism and Equality" (1987. Ed. Anne Phillips.) and "The Equality Trap - Why Working Women Shouldn't Be Treated Like Men" (1988. Mary Ann Mason*.) I have suspicions that research into why the Equal Rights Amendment failed would also garner insight.

[*Note: I just realized -- Mary Ann Mason is the same person who wrote "From Father's Property to Children's Rights: The History of Child Custody in the United States", which I referenced in my last essay.]

The issue that I've most frequently seen discussed with regards to women and this issue of problematic equality is pregnancy. If you view the male as the standard human being, then work situations will effectively penalize women for having children. If one redesigns the workplace taking women's experiences as the norm, then one comes up with proposals regarding day care, health care, child support, and paid leaves. This is not "equality" if men get to set the standard -- but if the realities of women's bodies and lives are accommodated in the first place, a form of equally fair treatment can proceed from there. [See "The Lenses of Gender - Transforming the Debate on Sexual Inequality" by Sandra Lipsitz Bem, 1993, pp. 73 -79, for a discussion of androcentric laws regarding pregnancy.]

Youth are wrongly denied legal rights. We must fix this. But to simply say "treat all youth the same as adults" isn't good enough. Infants need care in order to survive; young children need to be taught how society functions; and even teens need financial support to get started in the world -- whether that be from parents, the government, or other sources. Youth need special benefits that not all adults will receive...

I believe we can deal with the issue of legal rights by appealing to the concept that youth must not be property, rather than the concept of identical treatment.

III. MY "CONCESSIONS"

The title of this essay is "Joining the opposition?" -- which I intend to be tongue in cheek. I have no intention of giving up my loyalty to the cause. But it occurred to me to try listing a bunch of the points on which I agree with our opponents.

When trying to argue our cause, I've run up against the same objections over and over. Now, you have to realize, most of the workshops I've run have been for fairly like-minded people... When I start feeling like I'm just trying to slip out of their arguments -- maybe it's time to take a couple of months or years to really try to address what they're saying. In the process of doing so, I've abandoned certain arguments -- and there are certain objections that I now anticipate, and want to dispel before they're raised. It almost starts to sound like I'm agreeing with the opposition...

So, I say to myself tonight, let's not be scared of that. Let's try listing all the points on which I'm in (a sort of) agreement with the opponents.

1) I'm for maintaining the parent-child bond. It should be a default that a child stays with their biological parents.

2) An adversarial relationship between a youth and their parent(s) is not desirable.

3) Children are different from adults. The difference between a 17-year-old and an 18-year-old is negligible -- but an infant and a 40-year-old are very different. The younger the child and the older the adult you're comparing, the greater the difference.

4) Young persons have special needs. They need to be given food and shelter, orientation in society, and financial support. Some adults also need these kinds of support in a continuing way -- but all very young children minimally need these things for survival.

5) Simply sending a young person out into adult society to fend for themselves, without any support, is a bad thing.

6) There are a variety of ways in which treating youth as legal adults could seriously harm them.

7) Young people, particularly the younger they are, may be emotionally unstable, have irrational beliefs, and lack the competence to make important decisions about their own lives.

9) Legal guardians should have authority to take care of their children.

8) There are instances of conflict between youth and their parents where the parents, in good conscience, will be compelled to override the will of their offspring. Youth don't always get to have their way.

10) Parents should be engaged with their child. One should not simply leave the youth to their own devices.

11) Youth need warmth, nurturing, mentors, and role-models they can look up to.

12) It is the government's responsibility to intercede in cases of abuse, protecting children from unfit parents.

13) A form of state-sponsored compulsory schooling should exist.

IV. HERE COME THE CAVEATS

How can I agree with all these things, given the body of my work to date? It's all about the caveats.

1) I'm for maintaining the parent-child bond. It should be a default that a child stays with their biological parents.

Plato, in "The Republic", advocated that parents should be separated from their parents at birth, and never allowed to find out who they are. I can't support this position. I think that when a woman gives birth, she has a inherent right to stay connected to the being that has exited her body. As soon as the baby leaves her, it becomes a separate being with rights of its own. However, having no discernable interest in leaving the mother at birth, the infant should be kept with her.

[In fact, to the greatest possible extent, the infant should be held against the mother's skin immediately following birth, not taken away. Studies on child abuse have shown that this is a crucial moment for the mother to bond with the child -- which can help found a warm relationship for the years to come.]

I do say "default", however. I do not think that a family should be kept together at all costs. If there is abuse, the parent shouldn't necessarily get to keep custody. Whether because of abuse -- or simply because the youth has a strong desire to leave -- if the youth wants to move out of their parents home, I believe they must be allowed to do so.

Most families *do* function adequately, though. No need to fix what's not broken! YL, in my opinion, deals primarily with giving youth more options for when things go wrong...

2) An adversarial relationship between a youth and their parent(s) is not desirable.

An adversarial relationship is not desirable -- but that doesn't mean that a youth should simply submit to parental authority. If there arguments in good faith need to happen, then they should happen. And if the parents exercise their authority unjustly, then the youth should fight back. Domestic peace mustn't be founded on either subordination or squelching dissent.

However, even if adults have more extensive abilities than youth, it is wrong to cultivate a feeling of superiority. Adults should be humble about their abilities, acknowledging all that they are *not* capable of -- and honoring the honest struggles of youth to manage their own life with the facilities that they do possess. Rather than yanking young people's lives out of their hands, adults should do all that they can to maximize young people's self-determination.

Youth did not ask to be born. For imposing existence upon a youth, parents owe them at least the means for survival, without an reciprocal obligation of labor or obedience on the part of the youth. The parents' burden of support should be lessened by society, which should provide socialized services as a safety net that all citizens (including youth) can benefit from in times of need.

5) Simply sending a young person out into adult society to fend for themselves, without any support, is a bad thing.

Youth need caring assistance -- particularly during their earliest years. However, when a youth takes it into their mind to go out and explore, they should be enabled to do this. With regards to most rights issues, I am in concurrence with John Holt that rights should be made *available* to youth, at the asking.

6) There are a variety of ways in which treating youth as legal adults could seriously harm them.

There are several varieties of age-lines, some of which are problematic with regards to youth welfare. I've written about this elsewhere so I will merely synopsize here. (see "Exploration: Ageless Being - A Thought Experiment", section 5, from 12.20.04)

A) Skills required for communal safety
B) Minimal intelligence required for communal decision-making
C) Regulating the impact of vice
D) Assessing responsibility for someone's criminal actions
E) Identifying and empowering persons vulnerable to exploitation

At present, I don't think that YL has adequately addressed all of these types of age-lines. Particularly with regards to sexual exploitation, it is irresponsible in my opinion to simply erase age lines at present. I'm not happy with the age of consent on principle, but don't have a better solution. ...It's OK for us to not have all the answers yet.

7) Young people, particularly the younger they are, may be emotionally unstable, have irrational beliefs, and lack the competence to make important decisions about their own lives.

However, it is absurd to presume that youth are incompetent to control their own lives until they are 18. Rather subordinate youth to their guardians' will, guardians should strive to merely assist youth in following their own will. Standing in the way of a youth's will should be a grave matter, an action of last resort. Furthermore, the areas in which a parent *is* justified in overriding a minor's will should be clearly spelled out.

Parents predictably fear that young children will put a fork in an electrical socket, put a marble in their nose, run into the street, touch a hot stove burner, and eat nothing but cookies. Intervening in situations where there will be unintentional and immediate physical damage is justified -- punishment for these errors is not. [With regards to the cookies: why has an environment been created where these cookies are so available to begin with?]

With regards to teens, parents predictably fear drug use, teen pregnancy, gang involvement, and tattoos. If the behavior in question is criminal, then a parent has a legitimate dilemma about what to do. However, for issues where the teen is altering their own body -- e.g. through sex, pregnancy, dying hair, getting tattooed -- the parent can voice their personal opinions, but not try to veto. There may be serious consequences -- but none of them are the end of the world; they can all be dealt with.

It is more important for a young person to be able to have their own mistakes and be able to learn than for a parent to impose what they believe to be right. It is more important for a young person's sense of control of their own life to be respected than for them to be shielded from all negative consequences.

9) Legal guardians should have authority to take care of their children.

Parents or other legal guardians need freedom and flexibility in taking care of their children. However, there is a whole list of areas that parents should conscientiously, and in advance, decide that they will not control. The most fundamental principle that must be respected is that a youth is not their parent's property; the youth owns their own body and life.

[I have notes for "a new parent-child contract". See "Exploration: Youth As Their Own Property", from 10.06.04. ...I hope to expand upon this idea of an actual contract, or perhaps a "within-family youth bill of rights", in the near future.]

The younger the child, the more likely this is to be. For instance, you might go to a park with a child at 1pm, with a commitment to someone else to meet at 2pm. If the youth stubbornly refuses to leave at 2, then the conscientious parent has a dilemma. A conscientious parent can do a great deal to minimize the likelihood of having to overrule a child -- and I think there's a burden upon the parent to go out of their way to make concessions to the dependent youth -- but there will be unfortunate times when conflicts occur and the parent sees no other way out. It is forgivable.

However, come the teen years, overriding the will of the youth should be unheard of. If it comes down to a matter of criminal behavior such as drug-taking, the parent's choice is more or less to allow the behavior, or turn the child over to the police. This is the same choice the parent would face if they discovered one of their adult friends was using drugs.

10) Parents should be engaged with their child. One should not simply leave the youth to their own devices.

Generally speaking, young children want (kind) parental attention. Give it. Just because you don't stand in the way of youth freedom doesn't mean that you can't be interested in the youth and participate in their lives! Work to have a strong, meaningful relationship. Treat the youth with dignity, respect, and compassion. People, all people, tend to be attracted to someone who treats them this way.

But, if a youth wants privacy, or to have a life independent of you -- respect that wish.

11) Youth need warmth, nurturing, mentors, and role-models they can look up to.

All people, including adults need warm and nurturing people in their lives. It doesn't matter who they are. It could be two parents, a single mom, two married gay men, a familial collective -- so long as there's a strong personal connection with someone, it doesn't matter who. It just has to be someone who cares about you, and can listen and talk with you compassionately.

By the same token, we all need mentors and role-models. They can be people of our own age -- it doesn't matter. The point is that we need people we can learn from, and someone in the world who we respect and think is worth emulating. If a parent can provide this, that's great! But parents don't *inherently* offer these things, simply by virtue of having given birth.

12) It is the government's responsibility to intercede in cases of abuse, protecting children from unfit parents.

Youth need to be able to remove themselves from abusive situations at will, without having to go to an advocate that will then speak for them. This does not mean that adult-run child protection agencies should be shut down. Child protection agencies should remain in place -- and they should be adequately staffed and funded, which is not the case now. Very young children are generally unable to initiate self-defense measures. Older youth, however, should be given the tools to remove themselves from danger immediately -- and perhaps as well a knowledge of physical self-defense techniques.

13) A form of state-sponsored compulsory schooling should exist.

Compulsory schooling -- because it is compulsory -- is problematic for YL. There are three worthwhile courses of action here: (1) unschooling should be promoted as an option, (2) more alternative schools should be founded, and (3) mainstream public schools should be radically democratized. I am against abolishing schools altogether because they offer an important means to extract youth from a potentially abusive family situation, where they may be trapped. It is a bad thing for youth to be trapped in a tedious, degrading, or dangerous school situation, too. Yet, it seems to me that there must be some juncture where parents are legally required to allow their children to make contact with the public sphere. School seems like the best way to do that.

I also believe that education is important to the health of a democracy. To the extent that youth receive a benefit that adults do not, being given free education, I would like to see things equalized. I would like there to be some sort of system that gives people of all ages a means of furthering their education without expense. At higher-levels, this might deal with a system of scholarships... I've heard about programs that sound even-handed, but am not up on the topic enough to be able to reiterate how they work exactly.

V. A PRACTICAL APPROACH TO YOUTH JUSTICE

The YL proposals of Cohen, Farson, and Holt suffer from an appearance of impracticality. Their lists of equal rights sound good in principle, but when you try to imagine what their world look like in practice, it's difficult to really picture oneself as a youth using all these rights. ...You only use the rights that you need. Most of us just sort of slide along in life... And this picture of the world doesn't necessarily feel very well suited to very young children (say, 7 and under).

A few concluding notes about a practical approach to youth justice -- including how we get from here to youthtopia:

Write a new parent-child contract, founded on ownership of one's body. The contract places specific limits upon the parent's areas of veto power. The contract is entered into voluntarily by the parent, but could also be the rallying point for radical parents who support the YL cause.
Develop social services that enable youth to escape from harmful situations under their own power. Make assault on youth ("discipline") illegal; train youth in physical self-defense; eliminate curfews, truancy laws, and prohibitions on running away; fund public transportation; create more youth hostels / shelters / collective living units; establish scholarships for school.
Promote unschooling. Support founding new alternative schools -- particularly based on the Sudberry Valley School model. Work to radically democratize public schools: try to win youth real control over hiring, firing, funding, and curriculum decisions
Accomplish "Children's Rights" work through youth activism. The demand for change is most credible and compelling when it comes from the people who are actually effected.
Strengthen the youth community. Without community forums where youth learn about the history of adult-youth relationships and come to identify with youth as a group, there will be no pool of activists to replace the ones who are constantly aging out.
Work to educate youth about the rights that they have currently, how to recognize when those rights are being violated, and how to navigate a grievance process.
Help youth activist organizations move from simply protesting wrongs (e.g. the curfew) to engaging with legislators at the city, county, and state levels. Propagate knowledge about the practicalities of who the officials are, where and when they meet, and how to get a chance to speak. Talk about how to research laws and propose alternatives.
Work to address issues surrounding each of the different types of age-lines separately. Eliminating artificial age lines remains our ultimate goal -- but we need to address each type with sophistication, rather than lumping them all together. Our rhetoric is undermined if we argue for absolute equal rights but noticeably ignore the problem areas. This is theory work that we haven't completed yet.
Don't pretend youth are identical to adults. Instead, build upon the work of the people with disabilities movement. Dismantle the model of parent-as-owner. Replace it with parent as physical care-giver / provider of social orientation / financial patron. Work to deal with each of these roles separately, eliminating the mystique of the paternal protector.
Among adults, promote a new vision of what it means to be an adult, what a good family looks like, and our goal of wiping the last vestiges of persons-as-property from the face of the Earth.

Posted by Sven at 12:00 PM | Comments (3)

May 26, 2005

Research: The Origins of Law

[NOTE: This document was added to the blog on September 6, 2005]

In this document I'm going to try to sum up some research I've been doing. My facts may not all be accurate yet. This is me trying to get my facts straight, and sort out the big picture in broad strokes.

I want to trace the evolution of law from the origins of written law to the present.

This is part of a research project that began with the question "What is the origin of artificial age lines?" It's essentially a question about legal history. And that, I quickly discovered, meant that I had to research not just particular laws -- but the history of how law itself evolved. My hope in this expanding project was that I would be able to discover a direct lineage of written law, one society borrowing from the previous from the time of Hammurabi to the present. I've been extremely pleased to discover that this largely possible.

I. WRITTEN LEGAL CODES - THEIR EVOLUTION IN WESTERN CIVILIZATION

Here are the broad strokes:

1) Mesopotamia
The Code of Hammurabi (ca. 1700 BC)is one of the earliest written law codes. There are others from roughly the same period in Mesopotamia, but none as influential.

2) Before Rome
There is a period next that I don't understand very well yet, where the Hittites, Hebrews, and Egyptians emerge and evolve. I'm looking at this as the period between "the cradle of civilization" in Babylonia / Sumer and the emergence of the Roman Empire. Hebraic codes will clearly play an important role in Canon Law and obedience to the Torah / Bible -- but I haven't pursued course of religious history adequately yet. From my point of view, this period culminates in Hellenic Greece, where you have a very advanced constitution-based democracy in Athens. And then: Rome absorbs Greece.

3) The Roman Empire
The most important legal code of all time: the Corpus Jurus Civilis -- translated as "The Civil Law". The Corpus Jurus Civilis was a project of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I, produced between 529 and 543 AD. It collects a bunch of previous roman law, including the twelve tables, the pandects, etc. When you see the phrase "at civil law" in a dictionary, this is the document that is being referred to.

4) Common Law vs. Civil Law Explained
From here, law splits into two traditions: Common Law, and Civil Law. Civil Law is based on Roman Law, it's descendent. Common Law is based on customs, tradition, precedent. It is also influenced by Roman Law, but less directly. In the present day world, it seems that the countries of Europe (and their former colonies) are about evenly divided between those that follow the Common Law tradition, and those that follow the Civil Law tradition.

The tradition of Civil Law puts emphasis on written law created by legislators, judges playing a minor role in law-making. The Common Law uses judges much more as law-makers, and often avoids putting tradition into statute, for fear that doing so will interfere with the flexibility of judges to respond to specific cases. This could lead to very inconsistent judicial rulings, were it not for the principle of stare decisis -- "let the decision stand". A hierarchy of courts exist, and when a precedent is set, it is binding. Precedents are considered nearly inviolable.

Contrary to what you may think, given the Conservative furor over "judges making law", the U.S. is a Common Law country. If you go into a lawyer's office, the books that catalog statutory and constitutional laws would fit on a small shelf. The wall of books is the result of case law.

5) The Middle Ages
The Corpus Jurus Civilis is lost. To what extent it is remembered in countries of the Civil Law tradition, I'm unclear yet. Law is a matter of local authorities. Strange "superstitious" judicial systems arise, e.g. "Pick that burning hot stone out of the fire. If you heal within an allotted time, you're innocent."

It seems that the laws I'm interested fall into two distinct categories: Statutes and Constitutions. During the Middle Ages, Europe descends into feudalism and monarchies. Without a democratic or parliamentary system, there's no constitutional law to study. ...For this reason, I see that my next research project will have to be studying the origins of government.

6) The Enlightenment.
The Enlightenment seems to really be in motion between 1750 and 1800. During this period the Corpus Jurus Civilis, in its original Latin, is rediscovered by the Europeans. During the same period, there is what is described as a "codification movement", many countries putting their law into writing.

In England, codification results in William Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765-1769). When you see the phrase "at common law" in a dictionary, this is the work being referred to.

In France, codification results in the Napoleonic Code (1804, AKA the Civil Code). The Napoleonic Code was not the first codification among Civil Law countries -- but it was the most influential, and remains Napoleon's greatest contribution to the world. French and Austrian codes follow the Institutions system of Gaius; three parts: Law of Persons, Law of Things, Issues common to both parts. Germany and Switzerland's codes are structured according to the Pandect system: General part, Law of Obligations, Law of Things, Family Law, Law of Inheritance. (See "civil code" in wikipedia.)

7) The Thirteen Colonies
Being under the control of England, the colonies follow English Common Law. In this situation, the charters for each of the colonies seem analogous to constitutions -- but I don't expect to discover voting rights there. I have yet to discover where to find statutory law from this period -- but know it to exist. There is a particularly awful law from this period that was inspired by the bible, declaring that disobedient children may be killed. At least one author has gone out of their way to state that the law was probably never actually used.

8) The U.S. Constitution
The U.S. Constitution deals with three age lines: 25, 30, and 35 -- the requirements for being a congressperson, senator, and president, respectively. I believe that if a historical precedent for these numbers is to be found, it will likely be in the Federalist papers.

The age of 21 is not introduced until the Fourteenth Amendment (1868), and comes in the context of reworking the electoral college. The voting age is lowered to 18 with the Twenty-sixth Amendment (1971), I believe in reaction to the outrage of 18-year-olds being able to die in Viet Nam, but not have a say about the government sending them there.

I've found a document by the Ireland Law Reform Commission considering lowering the age of majority from 21 to 18 in 1977 (and simultaneously raising the absolute minimum age for marriage) which references similar movements to lower the age of majority in other countries. It appears that there was a sort of global movement afoot during the 70s. Whether other countries were following the United States' lead, or if it was the influence of the global Children's Rights movement, I don't know. The document does mention, however, that in 1962 the United Nations was urging countries to set absolute minimum ages for marriage. The history of the United Nation's influence (or lack thereof) is another thread to pursue.

9) Canon Law
I know that the Bible has played a major role in shaping youth-related law. However, I have made little progress on this thread so far, but for quotations from the Bible itself and the law from the thirteen colonies period, previously mentioned.

To my great surprise, codifications of Canon Law were not completed until the 20th century. There is a divide between the Eastern and Western Catholic churches that's relevant here, but that I don't quite understand yet. The Western church published its first code of canon laws in 1917; a revised version, the Codex Iuris Canonici was released in 1983. The Eastern Catholic churches were writing the Codex luris Canonici Orientalis, but suspended work on it in 1959. In its place, the Codex Canonum Ecclesiarum Orientalium was released in 1990.

A superficial review of these two documents suggests to me that they are similar to constitutions, dealing with decision-making structures. I know that there are papal declarations and whatnot somewhere out there that are more analogous to statutes, dealing with homosexuality, women's ordination, etc. I've yet to find them.

10) Contemporary Common Law
Blackwell's Commentaries on the Laws of England have been superceded. In England, they've been replaced by Halsbury's Laws of England. In the United States, they've been replaced by the Corpus Juris Secundum (a direct reference to Rome's Corpus Jurus Civilis) and the American Law Institute's Restatements of the Law. Each of these American works is something like a 40 volume set, costing more than $4600 to purchase. It is unclear to me if these are the products of two competing companies, or if there is a more complicated relationship between them.

II. YOUTH'S PLACE IN THE LAW

With this backdrop in place, now I'll try to summarize some of what I've learned about young people's place in legal history.

1) The Importance of Rome
Roman Law influences everything that follows after it. While I am still pursuing research on Mesopotamian, Athenian, and Hebraic legal codes, I am convinced that Rome is the fulcrum of legal history, the "big bang" that everything else seems to proceed from.

2) Freemen, Slaves, and Dependents
In the "Institutes" section of the Corpus Jurus Civilis I found this profound statement: "The principle division of the law of persons is this, that all men are either free or slaves" (TITLE III. CONCERNING THE RIGHTS OF PERSONS). [http://www.constitution.org/sps/sps.htm]

Later in the same document, I find this: "some persons are independent, and some are subject to the authority of others; and again of the latter some are under the control of their parents, and others under that of their masters" (TITLE VIII. CONCERNING THOSE WHO ARE THEIR OWN MASTERS, OR ARE UNDER THE CONTROL OF OTHERS.)

In other words, in the Roman world there were freemen, who controlled both slaves and the dependents living in their home (women, children). In essence, if not letter of the law, both slaves and dependents are human property.

Freemen were referred to as sui juris, "of one's own right". Slaves, women, and young people were under the absolute control of the male head of household -- the paterfamilias -- whose power was referred to as patria potestas. A distinction was made between slaves and dependents; however, slaves, women and children alike had to use a custom called the mancipium (from which we get the word "emancipate") in order to remove themselves from the father-husband-master's control. ...The commonalty with regards to the freeing process, I think more than anything else demonstrates that the essential people-as-property principle was in place.

3) Slave-like Statuses vs. Legally Defined Slavery

Let me depart from my focus on Rome for moment, in order to discuss this issue of people as property in a broader historical context.

...In "From Father's Property to Children's Rights: The History of Child Custody in the United States" (1994), Mary Ann Mason goes out of her way to counter the notion that Colonial children were viewed as property by the law:

"In labor-scarce America the services or wages of a child over ten was one of the most valuable assets a man could have. Thus fathers, without dispute, had almost unlimited authority of control over their natural, legitimate children, leaving almost no room for maternal authority, at least during the fathers' lifetime. [...] The existence of these common law rights have led some contemporary legal historians to conclude that the law regarded children as a property right, to be treated as chattel.

Yet, as indicated by the Massachusetts Bay Colony statute, the relationship between fathers and children was far more complex than these legal historians might have us believe. While fathers had almost absolute control over their children, fathers also had considerable responsibilities, both to their own children and to children legally bound to them as apprentices. In that sense the relationship between father and child was more that of master and servant than of owner and child. [...]" (p. 6-7)

Well, then, let's hear about the relationship between master and servant...

"To emphasize the similarities between the condition of children in various forms of servitude does not detract from the central fact that, both legally and conceptually, slavery was a distinctly different condition than indentured servitude. The central legal distinction was that indentured servitude was a contractual employment arrangement with rights and obligations adhering to both master and servant, while slavery was a form of property ownership where the slave held a legal status most closely akin to chattel. This meant that, short of murder, the master could use or abuse him as he could a horse. The master of an apprentice, as we have seen, was limited in the degree of physical punishment he could inflict upon his servant and was required to provide adequate food and shelter and, in most cases, elementary literacy and training in religion."

The thrust of Mason's objection to comparing youth to chattel (movable property) seems to be two-fold. First, there is the factual legal distinction, that youth were not dealt with as chattel under Common Law. The comparison to chattel, I've read elsewhere, has been a rhetorical tool dating back to the Abolitionists. Second, Mason seems to feel that being subject to near absolute control is significantly mitigated by the father's responsibility to provide food, shelter, and education (literacy, a vocation, religious training).

I do not find the argument compelling. It seems to me that Mason misses the gist of the social arrangement: adults command, youth obey. Even if we just look more closely at the enslavement of captured Africans, we discover that there are differences in status -- house servants had a better standard of living than workers in the field. Even if a slave-master were legally compelled to provide basic care for their slaves, this benefit cannot undo the fundamental repugnance of the non-consensual command-obey relationship... Which leads me to this:

"While a child had a clear obligation to be obedient toward his or her parents, the father had a mutual obligation to control the child." (p. 12)

I'm appalled to see Mason try to describe the command-obey relationship as one of mutuality. To argue ad absurdum, it's like saying that a murderer and a victim have mutual obligations to one another: the killer to kill, the victim to die.

Thus, I will take Mason's point to heart, that it is important to be precise when talking about legal history to get your legal definitions of status correct. And I will reject her notion that owing absolute obedience for the basics of survival in a society is a form of "mutuality". And I will persist in arguing that the essence of slavery is a non-consensual command-obey relationship -- a relationship experienced by slaves, women, and children under a freeman in the thirteen colonies, very much like that of slaves, women, and children under a Roman father.

Slavery, coverture, indentured servitude, dependence (as a minor), apprenticeship, and other master-servant relationships -- these are slave-like statuses.

4) Public vs. Private Spheres, re Legal Age Lines
In my research on legal age lines, an important distinction is emerging: there are laws that deal with minors under the custody of the paterfamilias, and there are laws that deal with the one's right as a citizen to participate in the government and civil life. This distinction could almost be identified as a difference between Statutory and Constitutional law.

It doesn't appear that the constitutions of any Western nations deal with family law. In their constitutions we find age lines that deal with being a voter, a senator, a president, etc. It is within statutes that we find law pertaining to the age of majority, parental responsibilities, etc.

An interesting note: Via the Ireland Law Reform Commission document, I learned that the ages for voting and holding various public offices varies widely according to nation. I have noted in the Athenian Constitution by Aristotle that you have to be 40, 50, or 60 to hold various positions. [I see similar things in Plato's Laws.] ...It will be interesting to see if I can find any connections back to the Greeks' age lines, as opposed to the Roman ones.

Another interesting note: In the U.S., the age for being a state-level congressperson, senator, or governor depends on what state you are in. Those lines are embedded in state constitutions. Law about age of majority, emancipation, parental responsibilities, etc. will be in the states' statutes. ...I know that there have been various efforts at promoting unified code on certain issues; I haven't discovered yet how to see if any age laws have been subject to this attention.

5) Constitutional Law Requires a Constitution
As I noted in the first section of this paper, when you're discussing government positions and voting, those are matters of Constitutional law. However, there's not going to be a constitution in a monarchy, is there? This insight suggests that I will need to research and write another paper on the origins of government.

6) Clues re the Origin of the Age of Majority
What is the origin of the "age of majority"? What was its first occurrence in written law? What rights did it confer?

Reading through the Ireland Law Reform Commission document, I was struck by the concurrence of marriage and ability to make contracts. Some of the component rights of the age of majority are the right to marry, the right to make contracts, and the right to vote. I'm beginning to suspect that the right to vote is a separate issue, one that has been lumped together with marriage and contract law for convenience. The Ireland document discusses raising the marriage age, and lowering the voting age, until they match... Is this a merging of the public and private spheres? (And in very recent times?)

Within the privacy of the patriarchal family, the key to understanding youths' status seems to be property ownership.

Only the paterfamilias is allowed to own. Whatever benefits his sons' labors bring in, belong to him. This remains so until the paterfamilias dies. If the son does not have legal right to own his own body, if the son does not have legal right to own his own labors, then how could he have the right to make contracts -- unless it is willed by the father?

I recall seeing something in Hammurabi about the minor son not being allowed to make contracts. A form of coverture also seems to be in place, where a father's crime may be punished by executing his son.

Marriage, originally, according to the Handbook of Marriage and the Family (1987. Ch. 27, "Families and the Law".), was a contract between private parties -- not a state-officiated status. It makes sense then, that a son would not be in charge of this contract-making... But then, it seems that marriage is one means of becoming emancipated.

Hm. Looking into the origins of emancipation may help answer this question. That sends me back to Rome again...

7) Clues re the Origin of Artificial Age Lines
One bit of bedrock I seem to have discovered is that in Roman times, puberty was commonly set at 14 for boys, 12 for girls. I've encountered various references to Roman theories of stages of development. These seem to be the rationale behind laws that deal with childhood within the family. Laws that deal with government posts, on the other hand, seem to be fairly arbitrary, setting "minimum standards" for important people, based on the presumption that older equals wiser. The arbitrariness of the one set of laws may have infected the other set over time...

I've encountered other societies' theories of stages of development, both for Athens and the Middle ages -- although I don't have any actual data transcribed yet. Stages of development will be an interesting thread to pursue farther. It seems pretty clear at this point that Philipe Aries' thesis that "childhood" didn't exist in the Middle Ages -- that people went directly from infancy to adulthood is false. [Various authors have criticized him on this point, and he himself more or less conceded.] Aries is not entirely wrong, however; there does seem to be an abrupt shift from "childish things" to adult clothing. One might interpret this simply as a failure of merchants to create sub-niches for marketing, as has occurred in present times.

[There is a relevant, fascinating custom in ancient Rome of having the son, at adulthood, strip off his clothing and put on an adult's toga. This is an amazingly clear instance of there being an adult dress code.]

8) Protecting Youth for Selfish Reasons
As I dig deeper and deeper into history, I'm finding more and more questions to ask:
- what is the origin of written law?
- what is the origin of constitutional government?
- what are the origins of constitutional age lines?
- what is the origin of "senior citizen" status and retirement age?
- what are the origins of legally recognized marriages?
- what is the history of the right to marry?
- what is the origin of emancipation?
- what is the history of adults' legal entitlement to obedience?
- what is the history of adults' explicit right to use corporal punishment?
- what is the origin of parental obligation to care for children?
- how has liability for damages caused by youth changed?
- what is the origin of the juvenile delinquency code?
- what is the origin of the curfew?
- what is the origin of compulsory schooling?
- what is the origin of our youth labor laws?
- what are the earliest origins of slavery?
- how did the legal status of slavery evolve over time?
- how did women's rights within marriage evolve over time?
- what is the history of indentured servitude and other slave-like statuses?
- what is the history of theories of stages of development?
- what is the history of adult-identified clothing?
So many questions! But I'm heartened to be beginning to find answers. Two leads are worth mentioning here.

It appears that legal parental responsibilities to care for one's children may have a selfish origin. Mason's book seems to be saying that these obligations had their origin in the 1601 English Poor Act -- which was intended to lessen the burden on society for caring for impoverished children.

In a similarly selfish move, U.S. laws against child labor seem to come from the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act -- a New Deal measure aimed at putting jobs in the hands of adults, by taking them away from youth. This also seems to partly be the case for retirement, which came into being circa 1935 (?). [The Social Security administration's website is unclear on this point, on a superficial reading.]

9) The Parallel Stories of Women's and Slaves' Liberation
I'm increasingly convinced that in order to tell the story of "The Invention of Adulthood", I'm going to also have to tell the story of women's and slaves' experience with being treated as human property.

Women in the 19th century were fighting for the right to divorce, to own property, to inherit, to make wills, to have custody of children (a form of ownership)... It seems to me that these struggles are far more like what YL must face now than those of the civil rights era.

There are interesting threads concerning marriage. Apparently divorce was easy in Rome -- but the Catholic church moved to make matrimony unbreakable. There's a transition from marriage being a contract between private parties to a status officiated by the state. Given that divorce has similarities to emancipation -- especially post- patria potestas, when divorce grants independence, rather than remitting control of the woman to her father -- right to divorce is a thread that needs to be pursued.

There seems to be connection between marriage and slavery. Gerda Lerner, in "The Creation of Patriarchy", suggests that women were the first slaves -- being easier to take captive and keep (due to their maternal bonds to infants) than men. ...I suspect that the existence of any slave-caste in a society has a chilling effect upon all relationships, permeating them with a similar dehumanization.

Mason points out that there were no provisions for slavery in the Common Law. The enslavement of Africans was a "peculiar institution" originating in the 14th century, along was a racial justification, if I recall correctly. I need to see to what extent slavery existed in Civil Law countries during the Middle Ages. If there were a continuing thread there, it would greatly bolster my rhetoric that YL is part of an ongoing effort to wipe away the last vestiges of persons-as-property.

III. NEXT STEPS

I've outlined a great deal many more questions to research above. ...Next I will have to start getting my primary sources organized, and find replacement citations for information I gleaned from non-authoritative texts such as wikipedia. Moving to the O.E.D. and perhaps the Encyclopedia Britannica may be good starting points -- but I'll also need to be looking for more specialized books now. [I've been astonished at how far I've gotten with just an unabridged Webster's Dictionary and the wikipedia!] I haven't decided yet if I need to get hard-copy citations for the various codices I'm studying, or if the "Liberty Library" online site will be adequate.

Posted by Sven at 12:01 PM | Comments (0)

Exploration: Youth Against Youth Liberation

[NOTE: This document was added to the blog on September 6, 2005]

I've written about this before, but at the time was using the term "Right-Wing Youth".

Not all youth support Youth Liberation. In fact, a large percentage would be against Youth Liberation -- even after being introduced to its ideas. ...See, granted many youth simply haven't encountered the ideas of Youth Liberation, and so they just go along with the flow. But resistance to YL, by youth, runs deeper than that.

My thinking here is highly influenced by the book "Right-Wing Women" by Andrea Dworkin. ...It's 1971, the second wave of feminism is cresting, and the slogan "Sisterhood is Powerful" is hitting the streets. There's this feeling among radicals that with 51% of the population, women are going to be an unstoppable force. All we need to do is raise women's consciousness, and they'll surely be on board with the cause.

But, it comes as a slap in the face to discover that not all women *are* on board with feminism. There are people like Phyllis Schlafly (in particular) who defend the notion of wives being subordinated to their husbands. Why is this? The Marxist Feminists fall back on the concept of "false consciousness" -- which to my mind is rather patronizing, and un-disprovable. ...Once you basically say that a person is wrong because they're deluded, there's no further room for argument.

Dworkin argued that Right-Wing Women are basically offered a better deal. It's the sexual revolution, and one segment of the feminist movement is feeling disillusioned, getting the sense that they're just getting exploited and used by "free love" men. So the choice looks like this: be the property of just one man, who has some obligations to care for you -- or be the property of *all* men, none of whom owe you squat. ...From that perspective, it makes a lot of sense to me why a lot of women would want to stick with the "traditional" patriarchal arrangement.

Back to youth. You're 16, legal adulthood is just two years away. You can either make a fuss and fight for your rights -- taking lots of flack from parents, teachers, and society in general along the way -- or you can simply wait out your time, aging out of minority. It's the path of least resistance. And all the privileges of adulthood are just waiting, shining in front of you; the fee-for-entry seems to be putting up with the 18-year hazing of childhood just a little longer.

Furthermore [and I know that I've said this numerous times elsewhere], youth are well-practiced at taking the point of view of adults. It's the dynamic of dissociation. The five year old protests, "I'm not a baby!" The eleventh-graders avoid hanging out with the tenth-graders, to avoid the stigma of being associated with one's inferiors. Most people spend the first 18 years of their lives not thinking of themselves as minors at all -- but rather, practicing thinking like adults.

I've listened to youth condemn Youth Liberation, talking about how children aren't competent to vote. Or about how they support the curfew, because youth are bound to get in trouble. It's rather amazing: the speaker never seems to doubt their own intelligence and good nature -- but their opinion of their peers is abysmal. I can't help but wonder: what portion of this is actually based on observation -- and what portion is based on the powerful image of youth-as-inferior propagated by adult society?

[Hm. This is an argument for contradicting stereotypes of youth that I haven't considered before: *dislodging them from youths' brains as a precursor to bringing them into the activist fold*. If this were the goal, the statistical information created by Mike Males would probably be most effective. The line of reasoning used by many Youth Equality activists, that "it's wrong to over-generalize", wouldn't be very effective, I suspect.]

Note on placement in the larger outline of essays: This essay should go in the same section where I discuss "dramatis personae" of the YL movement: 0-18 youth, 18-25 "tweens", 25+ adult allies (responsibilities & limits of each); the YL activist org (criteria); the branches of thought within the YL movement.

Hm. This suggests that perhaps I should also write a profile of the major opposition groups... Notably religious conservatives (e.g. Focus on the Family).

...Oh. In terms of talking about the "deal" that society presents youth (be a rebel and suffer, or be patient and get enormous privilege) -- I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the deal offered to religious youth. Secular society offers up legal status for putting up with minority. Religious communities (many of them) offer up heaven. "Honor your father and mother..." (which means "obey", I believe), is the fifth of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:2-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21). If you believe in the bible, then YL is seemingly a rebellion against God.

Religion offers a complete world-view that can be very difficult to argue with. The worldview offered by most YL thinkers, by contrast is very limited. Our area of focus tends to be limited just to a few legal rights, and a period of one's life that may only be 2-4 years long. I think our ranks remain thin partly due to this. Notice that the YL movement is being far outpaced by the Christian Youth movement. ...Ironically, some of these youth groups are also dubbed "Youth Liberation"!

It need not be so, however. YL has the potential to offer up a very expansive world-view: one that is not merely about a few years of one's life, but rather encompasses (a) what it means to be an adult, how do well at having a family of one's own, a vision of justice and fairness that takes it's strength from the principle that no person is property (and we must continue working to wipe out the vestiges of people-as-property), a world-view whose truth is firmly rooted in verifiable historical events.

A world-view is a powerful thing. Feminism, Marxism, Freudianism, Re-evaluation Counseling, and other such philosophies are compelling largely because they give you a lens -- through which it becomes possible to interpret the world around you. The sense of control provided by being able to make sense of the world -- is intense.

Posted by Sven at 12:00 PM | Comments (0)

May 22, 2005

12 essays from Jan-May 2005 uploaded

Over the past few days I uploaded twelve more documents, written during the period of Jan. 2005 through May 2005. ...Formatting takes quite a bit of time.
Posted by Sven at 06:32 PM

May 16, 2005

9 essays from Sept-Dec 2004 uploaded

Today I uploaded nine documents that I wrote during the period of Sept. 2004 through Dec. 2004.
The blog has looked dead -- but I've been busy writing. I just haven't been good about posting the results.

One of the reasons for this is that it's taken me a while to get comfortable with a new philosophy of writing. Despite my original vision for this blog, which emphasized putting up rough drafts, I've struggled against a perfectionistic streak that doesn't want to share unpolished work with the world. Here are a few thoughts that are helping me combat that streak now:
1. quality will be the by-product of quantity
2. don't mix generating text with editing it
3. for every ten essays I write, probably only one will be worth editing
4. it's OK to be a beginner -- to let my true level show
5. it's legitimate to write "explorations", wherein I simply try to sort out my own thoughts
6. it's easier to respond to a prompt, than to create out of thin air
At present I have 12 new YL documents written during 2005 yet to be uploaded. I hope to get them up soon. Once they're up, I have more than a hundred YL essays dating back to 1991 that I'd like to get online...

Patience!

Posted by Sven at 08:58 PM

May 10, 2005

Outline: New Framework for Historical Research on Adulthood

[NOTE: This document was added to the blog on May 22, 2005]

THE INVENTION OF ADULTHOOD
...A new outline, designed to help guide actual research

I. Youth as property / Adults as property owners

At my current stage of research, property seems to be the essential idea for understanding the evolution of adulthood. The model that best allows me to understand this comes from early Rome -- and I am expecting to find further support in periods prior to this. Family life was organized in a way where the father was essentially the king of his own kingdom, his home his castle. Women, slaves, and youth all had a similar status as living property. The father was the only person who was allowed to own anything at all. Thus, inheritance laws bore great importance.

Saying the "father" was in charge isn't quite correct. It was the oldest male, sometimes an uncle, who was in charge. Control passed down the male line via primogeniture (the oldest son). Women were like a separate species: excluded from inheritance, and subject to being sold off (literally) or married off (for profit or alliance) at the will of the male head of the house.

At the outset, fathers had the right even to murder their offspring -- and they seem to have maintained control of both sons and daughters even into adulthood. This absolute power seems to have been altered by the evolution of the state -- in its early stages, a monarch overseeing a city state comprised of many male heads, whom in a sense owned them all.

At the outset, discussing youth as property, we need to distinguish between several "slave-like" statuses. Reading "From Father's Property to Children's Rights", the author discusses at least three states: (1) enslaved children (not necessarily black); (2) children who were "bonded out" (essentially given to other parents as laborers); and (3) normal children, obligated to obedience. [A variation of this third state is apprenticeship, wherein the obligation of obedience has been transferred to another party, now responsible for educating the youth.] The author makes a big deal out of discussing how parents had a mutual obligation to provide youth with (1) food/shelter, (2) literacy, (3) vocational training, and (4) religious training. However, even if true slavery is defined by the absolute right to abuse and even murder a person without penalty, I do not think that this erases the property-like status of all youth. The obligation to give absolute obedience (and suffer punishment for disobedience) makes one property-like, even if parents are obligated to give some care to higher-status property. Consider how house-slaves were treated in the South; perhaps better than those in the fields, but as property nonetheless.

There are three relationships that we must be considering: parent-child, state-parent, and state-child. My current hypothesis is that the state initially saw parents as being liable for the actions of their child-property. As the state became more sophisticated, seeing that it had an interest in children growing up to be good citizens, parental responsibilities were formalized. As the state grew further sophisticated still, the warlord-monarch was slowly replaced by the diplomat-monarch, primarily in charge of overseeing peaceful commerce between and within nations. Merchant organizations contributed to democratization -- a means to having a permanent foothold in the nation's power structure.

As the government was increasingly controlled by the people, it was increasingly expected to provide services, rather than simply act as an autocratic, god-descended power. Parents, who now had a fair number of responsibilities for caring for their children, began to diversify and specialize the state institutions for dealing with managing children. The fundamental sense that children are the property of their parents persists; a tension exists between the government's property claim on youth as "our most valuable resource", and parent's property claim (I made it, I own it).

The origins of property itself seem to go back to owning land and owning a house. Being severed from the filial bond, meant to be cast out from the house and the land -- exposed to the elements. The male head-of-house's power seems to originate in being a warrior, fighting off those who would claim the land and house. Women, children, and slaves having a similar status seems to go back to tribal times, when women and children were taken as slaves. The ability to take men as slaves seems to be a later development, as it takes greater sophistication to control them (see Gerda Lerner's book on the Origins of Patriarchy). Taking human slaves at all, then had a profound effect upon the entire family, leading to relationships with native women more slave-like.

"Adulthood" seems to become a meaningful concept once there is a strong state apparatus, which needs to be able to distinguish between "freemen" and the non-free dependents (women, children, slaves). It appears that adulthood in itself was not originally enough to make one free, even among men. In Rome, adulthood came around 14, the age at which one could procreate. Men at 14 could become adult citizens of the state; women at 12 could become adult wives (property of a different man). Males remained under the control of their fathers until 25 it seems. [None of these points should be considered accurate yet -- I am still assembling information. Some information (e.g. freedom at 25 vs. being owned by the father until he dies) seems to conflict.]

Adulthood prior to Rome, e.g. in Mesopotamia, seems to be strongly related to becoming married. It looks like marrying and moving out of a parent's house may constitute adulthood. If so, that reinforces the link between adulthood and being, foremost, the owner of land.

II. Defining Adulthood

1. Biological... Give this equal attention to detail
- full height
- puberty = ability to procreate
- baby / adult teeth
2. Adulthood as membership organization
My premise in this work is that contemporary adulthood is like a membership organization. Certain criteria govern who may be considered a legal adult, and the status of adulthood grants certain privileges. The line between members and non-members of the organization is actively policed.

I am interested most of all in the origins of this organization. What is the first instance of an "age of majority"? Where do specific artificial age-lines first originate, e.g. 14, 16, 18, 21, 25? For how long have children been legally obligated to give obedience to their parents? How did parental responsibility to provide for one's children come into being -- and how precisely have those responsibilities been enumerated in law? How has the state's interest in intervening in parent-child relationships evolved? And what is the process by which the government has come to provide specialized services concerning youth (e.g. schooling, juvenile justice, child protection, youth labor laws, etc.) -- services perhaps benefiting parents, by relieving them of certain responsibilities?

Throughout my exploration of this organization's development, I shall be most interested in the role of adults as property-owners -- and owners of youth as property. I shall also be extremely interested in the command-obey relationship (the obligation of youth to be obedient to their parents). [Whereas most YL authors would be primarily concerned with winning youth the privileges that adults enjoy, I am most concerned with elevating youth from property to person status -- which I believe is a prerequisite to winning the privileges of citizens, and which I believe is strongly connected to delegitimizing the command-obey relationship.]

3. Age as character / culture
Maturity, as emotional control and a set of mannerisms could be more than simply a "virtue" that people are supposed to aspire to. It could also be viewed as a culture. By this perspective, adulthood is about what clothes you wear, what words you use, what arts you are interested in. This is in line with how the Romans had boys "put aside childish things" upon entering adulthood, and literally gave them new clothes -- the uniform of adulthood. That youth are capable of seriousness might be demonstrable through the reports on the behavior of children in the Sudberry-Valley School.

It might be argued that childhood is developed into a (mandatory) culture, which is sometimes given a sort of respect: as femininity is revered, so too the privilege of having a childhood is something to be protect. A child who is forced to behave in a mature fashion is said to have had their "childhood stolen".

The culture of adolescents, though largely produced by adult commercial interests -- and fueled by the attempt to steal the fashions of those with higher status -- is seen as a marker of inferiority. It is customary for adults to put down the musical and fashion tastes of teens. Notice how Aristotle (?) made very similar complaints about the youth of his era.

4. Mental age / stages of development
The Aries debate about whether children were viewed simply as "little adults" could be recast as debate about whether or not "children" was seen as having subcategories during previous periods. The essence of this theory is that there are a set number of stages, and one must go through each of them progressively in order to arrive at adulthood. Barring getting stuck in one of the "mental ages", adulthood is an inevitable realization. The "wisdom of experience" is both inescapable, and impossible to achieve early through effort. Note how "developmentally delayed" adults have "the mind of a child".

Prodigies are seen as abnormal exceptions, with adult abilities. However, a great deal of these skills are present or not-present simply based upon availability to practice. Note how "wiz kids" on computers were treated for a while; or how in earlier centuries, Mozart had musical instruments much more integrated into his environment.

I am dubious about attempts to create a "biological determinism" theory of youth. Recognize how biological determinism has frequently been used to justify subordinate statuses -- for blacks, for women. "Age-appropriate" guidelines (such as those that one may link to via the US government's websites) are helpful to parents; however, there is also risk for youth's equality. Note how several of Piaget's notions about youth inferiority (e.g. his belief that infants think a thing ceases to exist when it disappears) have been disproven. It seems that the new frontier for this field is brain development. Note how there was a spate of news articles following Columbine about teen brain development.

If youth are different than adults, then what we must put the weight of our attention is not on competency, but on accommodations that can maximize youth participation.

III. Adulthood through history
1. Prehistory
2. Mesopotamia
3. Athens
4. Rome
5. Byzantium
6. Medieval
7. Early England
8. Colonial America
9. Early United States
10. 20th Century United States
NOTE: These historical periods are necessary for the purposes of research. They will assist me in making sure that my understanding of each period is adequately detailed. However, the actual telling of the history of adulthood may ultimately proceed more via theme (e.g. parental responsibility, children's obligation to obedience, state oversight of parenting, etc.).

Posted by Sven at 12:00 PM | Comments (1)

May 05, 2005

Exploration: A New Contract Between Parents and Youth

[NOTE: This document was added to the blog on May 22, 2005]

This is an exploration. Rather than being an essay where I know where I'm going, the point of this document is to allow me to sort through some thoughts and see where I wind up.

1:50pm - 2:50pm = 1st hr
2:50pm -/- 4:09pm = 2nd hr
4:09pm - 5:09pm = 3rd hr
5:09pm - 5:39pm = 1/2 hr

I. WHAT DO I OWE MY PARENTS FOR HAVING GIVEN BIRTH TO ME?

Reading William Blackstone's "Commentaries on the Laws of England" (published 1765-1769), I come across this passage:

" 2. THE power of parents over their children is derived from the former consideration, their duty ; this authority being given them, partly to enable the parent more effectually to perform his duty, and partly as a recompense for his care and trouble in the faithful discharge of it. And upon this score the municipal laws of some nations have given a much larger authority to the parents, than others. The ancient Roman laws gave the father a power of life and death over his children ; upon this principle, that he who gave had also the power of taking away. [...]
THE power of a parent by our English laws is much more moderate ; but still sufficient to keep the child in order and obedience. [...]

3. THE duties of children to their parents arise from a principle of natural justice and retribution. For to those, who gave us existence, we naturally owe subjection and obedience during our minority, and honor and reverence ever after ; they, who protected the weakness of our infancy, are entitled to our protection in the infirmity of their age ; they who by sustenance and education have enabled their offspring to prosper, ought in return to be supported by that offspring, in café they stand in need of assistance. Upon this principle proceed all the duties of children to their parents, which are enjoined by profitive laws."

(Book 1, Chapter 16. URL: http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/blackstone/bk1ch16.htm Archaic spellings amended for modern readers' convenience. Footnotes in original deleted. Emphasis added.)

I'm fascinated by this discussion about how different societies conceive of the divine contract between parents and children. In Rome, a father could legally murder his son: in essence, "I made you, I have a right to kill you." In England, in the middle of the 17th century, the right to murder your offspring has disappeared -- but still, in effect the child remains the property of their parent: "I made you, you are obligated to serve me."

What I'm calling the "divine contract" could be phrased thus: "What do I owe my parents for having given birth to me?" My very life? My never-ending obedience? Perhaps, rather, ...nothing?

As I understand it, YL understands the divine contract between parents and children thus: "I did not ask to be born -- the world was thrust upon me. At the moment I become an separate animal, after leaving the womb, I am a person. No person is property owned by another. And no contract may be pressed upon me that I have not knowingly consented to. The burden is upon the parents to support my existence now that I have been created, and I am not obligated to compensate them in any way -- neither by labor, nor obedience, nor love."

I think it is presumption upon the part of parents that their offspring should be "grateful" for being given life. Parents should not play the role of God, becoming the omnipotent ruler of their creations. When human beings create new human beings, these new arrivals must be treated as equal beings, not inferior or naturally "subordinate" due to disabilities. Even among adults, there is a diversity of anatomical shape, intellectual skill, and mental competence. Let us choose to treat each other with equal dignity, affording respect, and compassionate accommodation of differences -- not build a hierarchy governed by those who are deemed "superior". Let us be humble about how great we are; adults and infants are equally ignorant of the true nature of existence; if there is in fact an omniscient deity, then let us leave matters of superiority to him/her.

II. PARENTS' REASONS FOR CREATING NEW HUMAN BEINGS?

Rather than seeing the parent-child contract as one of mutual responsibilities, YL places nearly the full burden of responsibilities upon the parents. This may initially seem unreasonably unfair -- but YL must raise questions about why parents choose to create new human beings in the first place.

Very reliable birth control exists in current times (in the U.S. -- not in all countries). The decision to not to have children, without giving up the pleasure of sexual intercourse, can be easily accomplished by most people of my generation. Still, accidental pregnancies are bound to occur. These can be aborted (if access to legal abortion services has not been disrupted by Right Wing politics). If a person has ethical objections to abortion, then they can choose to give birth -- which will obligate them to the parent-child contract -- or they can still avoid the committing themselves to the contract, by giving the child up for adoption. The parent-child contract, as YL conceives it, is burdensome and should not be forced upon a parent if they do not want to commit to it, and there are other persons in society whom are willing to.

In contemporary society, there are many honorable reasons why a person may want to intentionally have a child. [I'm certain I won't mention them all, or do justice to these...] For women, there is the curiosity of wanting to go through pregnancy, getting to experience the full range of possibilities inherent in one's body. There is the sense that sharing one's life with a new person will enrich the lives of parents and child alike. There is nostalgia for one's own childhood, and respect for how one's own parents raised one, that may inspire a parent to pass on the favor.

There are also reasons why a person may want to intentionally create children that are less honorable:
- Friends and relatives may put pressure upon one to have children (or grandchildren), parenthood becoming a way to acquiesce.
- Parenthood may be a matter of surrendering to the wishes of one's partner -- either because it's very important to them, or because it's simply unimportant to you).
- Parenthood may be an attempt to prove one's love to a partner, or to renew an already faltering relationship.
- Children may be seen primarily in terms of their cuteness, a sort of pet or doll.
- Parenting a child may be about attempting to re-parent oneself, becoming the parent you lacked, enjoying nurturing now vicariously.
- A child may be an attempt at immortality, creating someone who will carry on minimally your name, or perhaps your business and values as well.
- A child may be the attempt to create the you that you failed to be -- pressing them to be an artist or athlete (etc.) because you feel that dream was denied to you.
- You may have a child as a means of promoting or preserving your political or religious ideology in the world.
- You might create a child in order to make yourself feel like an adult, or a "real man", or a "good mother", or heterosexual.
Parents in previous periods of history were in a different position than we inhabit now in at least two significant ways. Firstly, preventing pregnancy -- while still having sexual intercourse -- was a much riskier and difficult task. Sex, much more inevitably, would result in pregnancy and birth. Secondly, the conditions for survival were typically much more difficult. Without regularly producing more babies, a community was much less likely to survive. Without replacement citizens, a settlement would die out relatively quickly. Given that settlers were very interdependent upon each other for survival, the pressure to procreate is very understandable. [The flip-side of this is that in an established society where resources are scarce, but birth control is unavailable, infanticide may be understood as a way of making sure that there aren't more available mouths than available resources can accommodate.

III. JUDGING THE CONTRACTS IMPOSED BY PREVIOUS GENERATIONS

Parents in previous periods birthed children and non-consensually demanded labor of them in exchange. In many cases this coercion was done for the sake of personal survival, which mitigates the offense somewhat. Mitigates -- but does not pardon. [A case can be made that allowing the species to die out is not an objectionable outcome -- but that's a matter for another essay.] ...Still, what is the point in judging past societies? I will not make the relativist argument that "we cannot judge them by today's standards". Being all dead, judging our ancestors is moot; I will choose to forgo a real ethical evaluation, instead simply acknowledging that we could not arrive at our current options for ethical behavior had they not built civilization to this point.

In the U.S., the wealthy heart of an empire, we have great material potential for advancing to a more perfectly ethical society. Whether we are collectively primed for this transition politically, psychologically, religious-/spiritually -- is a whole other question! But we do have adequate food, lumber, person-power, technology to consider YL's vision of the parent-contract as a realistic possibility.

IV. DEMOCRATIC SOCIALISM: DISTRIBUTING THE BURDEN OF PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITIES

Reviewing historical legal developments, it seems that a great deal of the laws dealing with families are about an implicit parent-society contract. Having chosen to give birth to a child, society wants for the parent to be financially responsible for its care. Why should other citizens have to pay?

Why? Because we hope to cooperatively create a pleasant society to live in, rather than a brutal "every man for himself" environment. Without a government, the strong subjugate the weak and create their private fiefdoms, unopposed. Without an inclusive, democratic government, the strong gang together and to wrest political power from the common people whom the government is meant to serve. Kindness cannot be mandated; but cruelty can be regulated and suppressed.

Among Liberals, one of the defining features of our desired society is equality. We oppose discrimination. In letter, that may be interpreted as a directive to treat everyone the same. In spirit, it's a prohibition against intentionally treating certain disliked groups more cruelly than others. We support creating a social safety net that will keep people's personal situations from becoming too painful. We promote making accommodations in our physical landscape and in the processes of its institutions so that many different groups are able to participate in communal life. We look at the diversity of anatomy, competence, and access to resources among our population and try to find ways minimize suffering among all, increase ability to participate willfully for all.

Given these values, we must collectively contribute financially in order to support the special needs of youth.

Particularly since the institution of mandatory schooling in the U.S., there has been a growing public interest in managing the destinies of youth-as-class collectively, rather than abandoning them to the will of their parents. Intervention in situations of child abuse is another bellwether.

From a YL perspective, the main financial contribution that society must make is toward enabling youth to escape abusive parents at will. Youth need:
- public transportation
- youth hostels
- free meal programs
- welfare checks
- health care
- scholarships to schools (in order to be able to enter a profession)
- training about the legal processes of emancipation and filing discrimination complaints and how to access political representatives.
With these services in place, a youth could live outside the control of their parents. It would not be a luxurious life, but a form of survival that is at least not too harsh. These are services that should be available not just to youth -- but to all. It might be argued that without the threat of perishing in poverty, society would fall apart, the weight of the lazy who coast through life breaking the backs of the workers who support them. I disagree; there is adequate wealth in this nation to support all -- but it has been concentrated in the pockets of a few wealthy corporate leaders, forcing most of us struggling for scraps.

The ambition to have a better-than-minimum life will keep an adequate number of people working. Capitalism need not be abolished -- merely regulated. A redistribution of wealth can be accomplished in part by capping how much a person is allowed to take as income. [Money is a symbol; we need not give our blessing to god fantasies of the successful.]

Accomplishing this socialized society will be an uphill struggle against greed and fear. Fortunately we need not begin from scratch. We already have many socialized services (many stemming from FDR's New Deal), which we can build upon.

To a great extent, the interests of YL are simpatico with those of Democratic Socialism.

[Note: I realize that society runs on money. If judges aren't paid, the courts are forced to shut down. If prisons are not funded, prisoners have to be released. A down-turn in the economy can have a direct impact upon doing the work of justice.]

V. THE SPECIFIC RESPONSIBILITIES OF PARENTS

An infant is a person, not property. In theory, they are independent beings -- even if they require the services of a compassionate caregiver for mere survival. Given this independence, one might think a parent has no inherent right to custody of the child. I do not argue this. I think that there is an inherent affinity between parents and their offspring that must be presumed until proven otherwise.

[Breaking the bond between parent and child, removing a young child from the parents for significant amounts of time, should be avoided as much as is reasonably possible. In this, I am in agreement with my political foes. However, we depart company when it comes to what we consider reasonable circumstances.]

...My original question was "What do I owe my parents for having given birth to me?" My answer: Nothing. However, for compelling me to exist, they owe me the means for independent survival.

What does this mean in financial terms? What standard of survival do they owe me? It's easy to imagine YL activists demanding a financially expensive standard of living for youth. We must beware of oppressing the poor and the homeless. Being poor does not make one an inherently bad parent -- although, it seems, poverty has frequently been used as a means for condemning parents. Shifting a great deal of the burden for providing public transport, etc., to society at large serves to lessen the burden of the parent-child contract on parents without money.

If we demand of parents that they provide clothes, they need not be new clothes. If we demand that youth be allowed some privacy, this should mean a place to safely hide a few possessions, ability to be alone for periods, etc. -- not necessarily a room of their own. ...We should not assume that there is a house.

In the American colonies, before the founding of the United States, the responsibilities of the parent to their child were these: (1) food and shelter, (2) vocational training, (3) to teach literacy, and (4) provide religious training. The parent's responsibility to society (also their privilege) were: (1) to maintain control of the child (by means of inflicting pain if "needed"), and (2) be held responsible for the youth's misdeeds (?). The child's responsibility to the parent: obedience. [This is my own summary of information from the book "From Father's Property to Children's Rights".] ...During that period, I'm not sure what society's responsibility to the child could have been.

My concern is primarily with the child's responsibility to be obedient -- clarifying what areas the youth has right to control. I have an actual contract in mind, to clarify what parents do and do not have power to determine...

Unfortunately, I've run out of time to continue writing today.

Posted by Sven at 12:00 PM

May 03, 2005

Exploration: Expanding Parents' Role in YL Work

[NOTE: This document was added to the blog on May 22, 2005]

This is an exploration. Rather than being an essay where I know where I'm going, the point of this document is to allow me to sort through some thoughts and see where I wind up.

I. PARENTING IS A VITAL, MISSING PIECE OF THE PUZZLE

Liberal / Equality YL (A.K.A. the "Youth Rights" movement) focuses on equal rights for youth as citizens. It looks at youth's relationship to the government, and largely ignores their relationship with their parents -- both legal and social. Youth Power, as I've described it, sees the parent-child relationship as the fundamental origin of adultism. The one-on-one, command-obey relationship gets elevated into law. I mean that both historically, and in terms of how new laws originate out of shifting cultural norms.

This insight, that the command-obey relationship within the family is the origin of adultism, is relatively new to me. It is still permeating the rest of my thought; there are portions of my thinking that haven't adapted to the shift yet. One of these may, oddly enough, be the importance of parents in the YL movement. Previously my focus was on how youth are treated as a class, and how youth activists can fight back, independent of adult assistance. I've said "I leave the application of YL principles to parenting to other authors". I think the time has come to change my mind about this.

If the parent-child relationship gets elevated into law, then the way that we're going to change the laws is by having a groundswell of parents call upon legislators to change things. Not to say that youth are suddenly unimportant in the process -- I maintain the belief that a process for bringing about youth rights that does not involve youth themselves is inherently adultist, and is ripe for corruption.

Yesterday or the day before, I had the sudden realization that unschooling parents are a potential market for YL texts. I'm coming to a greater appreciation of the fact that probably most parents have passionate feelings about how youth should be raised. Some of these people are sympathetic to YL -- after all, the unschooling movement (I believe) crystallized around Grace Llewellyn -- who was inspired by John Holt, if I recall correctly. [I also just discovered "Taking Children Seriously" via wikipedia, which seems to be a Libertarian attempt at non-coercive schooling.] ...Furthermore, yesterday I was at Powell's on Hawthorne listening to the author of "The I Ching for Writers" -- which got me thinking about how you could put your intended audience directly into a book title: "YL for parents", "YL for teachers", etc. ...Anyway, the significance of all this is that I've suddenly realized that there is indeed a diverse population of radical parents (e.g. readers of Hip Mama) who constitute a market for YL.

It occurred to me today that the Left really doesn't have any sort of analysis of how youth should be treated. The Right has very successfully mobilized around "family values". Of course, their vision of family is hierarchy: children obey parents, wives obey husbands, husbands obey king and country, and the king / president obeys God. Liberals value equality -- but have only worked out what that means with regards to women. In the life-cycle of the family, basically they know what to do up through the dating and marrying stages. But if you don't have answers about how to parent -- then your movement can only last one generation. Which, given how the Right has taken control of the country, could be a possible legacy of the 60s: one sole generation of justice lovers pushing the boundaries. The more I think about it, the more I see a huge niche in the dialogues of the Left for what it means to parent well. We seem to know that we support abortion -- but what comes after that? Lefties are interested in schools -- but what about home life? Righties know what they want in the home, and they push it into the school. We, on the other hand, have nothing.

[Addendum: Whereas for the Left, parenting remains a private matter, the Right has embraced parenting as a public / communal concern.]

OK, so in a previous document (at present unpublished on the web), I spell out how different age groups have different roles to play in the movement. I discuss 0-18 as genuine youth, the people whom the movement is for; people aged 18-25 as being in a gray state, needing to moderate their influence on the movement; people aged 25+ are full-fledged adults whom need to play supportive roles, and conscientiously avoid wresting control from the actual youth. With regards to adults, thus far I've only really discussed "adult allies" -- by which I mean volunteers working inside of youth-led activist organizations. Now I think I'm at a point where I can more clearly discuss the role of parents, which at present I will define thus:
1. practice non-ownership style parenting
2. fund YL organizations
3. volunteer for youth-led YL organizations
That second point, about funding YL organizations -- that's a really critical piece. YL is destined to be a ghettoized, fringe movement unless it gets better funding. Radical parents have the money and the motive to invest in the movement. There's also a profound opportunity for them to subvert YL. But given how things are now, how much worse could that really be? This leads me into a discussion about how the money of radical parents fits into our cause.

II. RADICAL PARENTS HAVE THE MONEY AND MOTIVE TO PUSH YL FORWARD

There is only one way to win youth rights: fight. If you don't show up for the fight, the other side wins by default.

Where are YL's battlefields? The state legislature is a major battlefield. Today I was listening to the radio, about how there are new efforts to require pregnant girls to tell at least one parent before they get an abortion. It infuriates me -- and the line of argument is classic Youth Liberation. The Republicans say that a girl shouldn't be alone, that it is an act of love to make them connect with a parent. Obviously, though, the motive is not love here -- it's control. The Republicans depict the girl as scared, confused, coerced, and parents as inherently kind and wise. The Democratic opponents of this bill tell stories about a girl who was raped by her father for years, while the mother stood by and did nothing... Basically they're arguing for exit freedom. A youth is a thinking person, and if you trap them with the parents, some portion of those parents are going to be absolute monsters. There has to be a door out -- and it should not be made difficult to access.

OK, so the state legislature is a battlefield. The county and city governments are also battle-fields. [Courts and individual schools are, too, but let's leave those aside for the moment.] In each of these domains, you have one or many decision-makers. Our goal is to press them to make decisions that favor us. When we're doing well, we'll be the ones promoting new, good laws. Most of the time, however, we'll simply be trying to halt bad laws from passing. This raises more questions: If there are decision-makers, when do they make their decisions? How do they make the decisions, process-wise? How do we find out that a decision is upcoming? Who among us will be paying attention to the relevant news outlets?

Politics are won by money funneled through expertise. You can run organizations that watchdog the legislature on a volunteer basis -- but it's very difficult. When the legislative session is on, checking up on new bills and where they are in the legislative process can be an almost full-time job, requiring daily attention. ...Jobs that require consistency beg for paid positions.

If there's a constituency of radical parents who have an interest in watchdogging the legislature, then it should be possible for them to form a 501(c)(4) non-profit organization, and raise money to pay someone to spend all their time watching what's going on. [Of course, if you're lucky, then there may be other progressive organizations already watching the legislature, who are willing to keep your group informed, as a matter of solidarity. That's a tricky, high-level negotiation, though!]

There is a danger in setting up such a non-profit, however. We all want non-profits to do the work of social change for us -- so we don't have to. It's a fair trade: I'll donate $20 a year, and you do the work that I cannot. However, we also want a grassroots cause, where the constituency is actively involved, not just passive. The work of watchdogging the legislature, lobbying, etc. may get divided up between different groups; still, there has to be a central organization that develops the youth community. The youth community (once it actually exists!) gives the campaigns that follow their direction and legitimacy, and they address the issue of organizational turn-over (which YL in particular must face).

Adding to what I've said previously about adult allies within youth-led organizations, here are the seven main areas of information that adults must focus on transmitting:

A. History
1. the history of adultism
2. the history of youth lib (and its various branches & strategies)

B. How to make change
3. how governmental decision-making processes operate
4. how to design a direct action, leveraging decision-makers
5. how to run an organization

C. Self-defense
6. legal rights that do exist and how to make use of them
(abortion, discrimination, etc.)
7. physical self-defense / safety-planning

...For some time I've been overwhelmed by the number of stages on which the drama of justice gets played out. Perhaps some are more significant than others. The state legislature is pretty crucial. Most family-related issues are legislated there -- not at the city or federal level. ...Though certainly there are laws there, too -- perhaps I should say that it depends on the law. Curfew laws, for instance, exist at both the city and state level. But laws about drivers' licenses are only at the state level... Anyway, I could see that the real spine of the Youth liberation movement is the interaction between state government, radical parents, and youth community. This formulation may not address schools, or court issues, or the media -- but it's a solid foundation, which can expand to address other issues as needed...

This actually deserves some more attention -- what the infrastructure of the movement is like. Perhaps I've been too atomistic, only looking at the idealized organization, when really I need to be looking at a collection of interrelating parties. Previously, I've discussed national organizations and conferences; perhaps talking about the ongoing development of local youth community is better -- the movement is larger than just its organizations.

III. A NEW CONTRACT BETWEEN PARENTS AND YOUTH

NOTES:
- patron / guide / caregiver - the three roles of parents
- the colonial articulation of parental responsibilities
- principles to guide the parent
- my first listing of parental contract (10.09.02)
- the birthday contract renewal concept
- economic options
- the contract spelled out in detail
- forming a community of radical parents around the contract
- elevating the literal contract into the law of the land, the contract between youth and society
- the necessity of democratic socialism for this vision -- providing services for all
- with regards to society and youth, the contract is very much about where the money to support them will come from
[Title for this section as a new document: "Exploration: The Parent-Child Contract"?]

Posted by Sven at 12:00 PM

The GENERATOR

May 27, 2005

Exploration: Joining the Opposition?

May 26, 2005

Research: The Origins of Law

Exploration: Youth Against Youth Liberation

May 22, 2005

12 essays from Jan-May 2005 uploaded

May 16, 2005

9 essays from Sept-Dec 2004 uploaded

May 10, 2005

Outline: New Framework for Historical Research on Adulthood

May 05, 2005

Exploration: A New Contract Between Parents and Youth

May 03, 2005

Exploration: Expanding Parents' Role in YL Work