Let's Get Honest! Absolutely Uncommon Analysis of Family & Conciliation Courts' Operations, Practices, & History

This post is:

One of my recent posts,

as you can see was in process since May 2, but only published nearly four months later.  Why:  for whatever reasons, some perhaps relating to my strong emotions dealing with the longstanding topic, it was just not coming together:  Adding on wasn’t working.  Off-ramping wasn’t working either.  Finally I figured I should stick with the original idea, resist the temptation to elucidate so much, and let most of those extras go.

Sometimes obstructions to a smooth-flowing post may also relate to personal challenges which can impact the overall fluency of this type of writing, which requires undistracted focus.  (See “Footnoted Feelings 9/13,”  “Footnote: Anecdotal Narrative” and “ANECDOTAL INDIGNATION: also FOOTNOTED!” both of which came up earlier in the composition of this post).  You will be able to see those footnotes better when I publish them. They are now officially evicted from THIS discussion (post)! to: ‘Anecdotal Narrative | Indignation (Aug. 2019) and Feelings (Sep. 2019) Footnoted (from Builders and Their Blueprints post) [started Sept. 14, 2019] (short-link ends “-b41” and the last character is a number). 

As part of that “let it go” effort, I now have this post, which better explains a key theme of that one — common sense says, before choosing Reforms, Solutions, Enhancements** or Adjudication Improvements, ask, and find out who were the builders and show the blueprints which show purpose/design, intent.

**FAMILY COURT PERFORMANCE ENHANCEMENTS?

For a general idea and some search strings on existing family court reform movements (mostly but not all in the USA), see these tags from the first post in search results for “FCEP” on this blog  That sticky post, near the top, deals with the topic of “Censorship” (although it begins “Welcome To My Blog… Let’s Talk!”).

FCEP seems to have followed up on (but not changed course much from) “The Greenbook Initiative” which was run about 2001-2008. Meanwhile, another joint Wingspread Conference was held on related topics around 2007/2008 (<=nearly a dozen years ago!). Given who was running this, what unspoken, unproven assumptions drive the last dozen years of reforms being promoted by those involved in for example, the “Collective Memo of Concern re: parental alienation” to WHO?” and similar task forces, legislative propositions in individual states in the USA?

LGH tags for post in top position on search results (on the blog only) for FCEP:

“How Freud Got Under Our Skin”, AFCC + IACP overlap, BWJP + CCI (Center for Court Innovation) + NCJFCJ ~~>FCEP Guidelines for Custody, Family Court Enhancement Project, Family Courts as a business model (and possible exit strategies for creators + profiteers from it), H.Con.Res.72 (House Concurrent Resolution #72 on Child Safety in Family Court Proceedings), IACP (Internat’l Assoc of Collaborative Professionals),

Current Family Court Reform Practice doesn’t even acknowledge blueprints or builders exist:

Why not?  I can’t say for sure, but I can see why this might be a real problem to some:

• To acknowledge that builders exist would be to identify them, correctly, as nonprofits, a form many of the “family court reformists” also assume for handy references when quoting themselves and/or each other.
• To understand that builders exist and, correctly, identify them as nonprofits is to understand MUCH more about who each of them is, how (honestly or not) they fill out tax returns, where (by category at least) their revenues, if anything much, come from.  Looking at organizations as nonprofits and business operations (micro, inactive, medium, or “mongo” — huge) speaks often louder than the graphics, logos, pictures, and repetitive mutual-back-slapping and footnoting (in academic publications on-line) ever does.
• To understand the above is en route to also better understanding our own government, which continues to deal with and heed the counsel of  NON-representative NON-elected PRIVATE, purposes of the few who are so intent for application of their programs (developed through and run through, often tax-exempt organizations) on the many at the cost of, mostly, the many for the long-term profit of, mostly, the few. These “few” prefer to utilize tax-exempt format for organization — a format governments also operate within. Governments pay payroll taxes for their own employees BUT their profits aren’t taxed.

There’s a natural affinity between the two sectors and it’s natural to switch employment after terms of office may finish from one sector to the other sector.  Former government employees with their developed contacts can be grrrreat for nonprofits who seek contracts and grants from the same.

The US government and from what I can tell the various state governments already operate, despite constant talks of BUDGET deficit, at profit, and holding those investment assets (Topic: CAFR, searchable on and off this blog).  The ongoing taxation merely seems to front the long-term-debt on the front end by projecting it forward endlessly. That this goes places it can’t be tracked, ℅ chameleon, MIA, and merging/sub-merging in and out of existence nonprofit I’ve brought up repeatedly throughout this blog, and identified repeatedly in the “marriage/fatherhood” grants, but not only that funding stream.

Similar behaviors found within massive system change in public education (backing of major private tax-exempt foundations and involvement of university “center”  or “Institute” for [A,B,C,or D…]” often involved: (AISR/CES** at Brown University<~on this blog, see esp. my April 11, 2017 (<~~Read!!)(shocked/indignant post) and not too long ago, an example in the “early childhood education” field involving a Warren Buffett (i.e., Berkshire Hathaway shares-backed) foundation (Alliance for Early Success)  [**Annenberg Institute for School Reform/Coalition for Essential Schools].

Yes, story-telling with bright colors may distract from the fiscal outlines and behaviors of the foundations involved (see next image).

I noticed “Alliance for Early Success” through “Harvard Center on the Developing Child, which again has a lot of graphics, websites, personal profiles of involved people and lists of “investors” but when you go for the “Drill-down” by EIN# of what is registered, what isn’t, that’s an entirely different perspective: I’ve gone for this info., repeatedly, researching specific subject matter as it comes up).

Earlier in 2019 I have some posts on this topic, just referencing it again here, 9/15/2019. Look at the foundation names at “earlysuccess.org” (home page slide-show (with left sidebar stable) continues the story-telling and advertising. Notice “Buffett” is near the top, but Pritzker (Current Gov. of Illinois is a Pritzker), Gates, Casey (big in Foster care and responsible fatherhood also), Heising-Simons (I looked up, you can too); Packard obviously computer-related. etc.

This  behavior is more than ‘normal,’ it’s become seemingly standard practice. USA schools (by recall, offhand) where I’ve noticed (in course of writing this blog) include: Harvard, MIT, Yale, Brown, Princeton, Columbia University (NYC), Cornell, SUNY, University of Pennsylvania (<~private) and Duke (<~EastCoast sampler),  UC-Berkeley, Stanford, UCSF (public), USF (private, Jesuit), and so forth, West Coast, and plenty more in between.

See next image: screenprint from my 2017April 11 post after looking up/for financials in the school-reform centers backed by the Annenberg Foundation and involving Brown University in Rhode Island (admitted women first time, ca. 1969; immediately diluted the curriculum).  My opening statement (not to mention, the title) mentions system parts.  This post might be a good review and wake-up:  Under this way of doing business (public, private, mass population going through basic government-funded institutions, whether as privatized or as kept under obvious government control), no person could possibly keep track of it all in their “spare time,” and it’s questionable whether people even paid full-time to do so would.

Top portion of my April 11, 2017 post (http://wp.me/psBXH-5gG), search result for “Brown University” looking for the AISR information for a Sept. 15, 2019 post insert..

Getting to this type of information, should doing so somehow cross someone’s mind in the first place between the story-telling, great causes, and brightly colored graphics and slideshows  (i.e movement) requires overcoming some obstacles which seem less than accidentally strewn in the paths to that information, which situation increases personal time (which = expense) involved while decreasing prospects of even accuracy of such searches, i.e., discouraging the investment of that time and expense to start with.

Who knows whether existing databases that the public cannot access (due to power required) MIGHT, but I do know experientially that the basic public-access databases (whether state-level or via existing private nonprofits such as FoundationCenter aren’t accurate or functional enough to do so.

(Foundation Center (based in NY) again, just bought out Guidestar and rebranded as “Candid” but — I checked again last night, looking up several nonprofits related to this post via cell-phone), despite brighter colors (Black, white, BRIGHT yellow), more high-contrast user interface, what survived the merger includes the corrupted data practice of getting organizations’ names WRONG, whether by adding or subtracting a “the,” losing an “‘s”” or eliminating spaces between the words, or opting for different and unpredictable shortened versions of organization name in subsequent years.

Searchers won’t even know what they missed until they somehow repeat the search by EIN#, at which point it coughs up the tax returns pinned to mis-spelled organization names, not from the data source (which we’re told is the IRS), but by the database provider, “Candid.” (which is, the privately owned business, Foundation Center, Inc.)

Meanwhile, the one searchable field which is harder to get wrong — it’s only 9 digits and that’s “EIN#” — remains submerged in “other search options” not displayed on the top level of “990-finder” search page. To anyone simply aware that EIN#s are searchable, this is a not-very-subtle message:  “GO ahead!  But its’s an extra click each time” and those who, perhaps, may not think to or know to find an EIN# and use that only as the search condition, will not be alerted that even if THEIR data entry (search requests) has no typos in organization name, changes are, some are built into the database itself and may not know what they even missed.  All this erects artificial barriers to getting what is really, very basic information on organizations.

Perhaps I should start a petition called “OVERCOMING BARRIERS” and show public support to demand tax-exempt organizations claiming tax-exempt status for promoting philanthropy (the tax-exempt field overall) adhere to common decency and minimal copyediting style sheets (how to abbreviate, proof-reading for spelling or spacing errors) in human data entry, or whatever automated software function produces those search result names in all FREE (non-subscription) data searches. I have done data entry, copyediting, and text-processing in professional fields and continue to be amazed by how bad the data results are here, and in some federal and other state government search sites.  

If NASA, hospitals, the military, oil exploration and drilling, artificial intelligence, GENE therapy, or any large, hard infrastructure process dependent on accurate software information were that bad, there’d be even more massive failures, levee and dam failures, etc. PG&E was sued in California for failures relating to  the wildfires. But somehow when it comes to tracking where government funds go — and they go to and through nonprofits, obviously — NOT even close enough for jazz it seems is just fine… 

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The contrast between entrancing, colorful graphics and the lack of financial details on the same websites (or, elsewhere  where they should be) is often astounding. It’s clear they are learning from each other, and as of the appearance of “The Frameworks Institute” which I mentioned on this blog, receiving coaching in how to translate science into policy-making, user-friendly terms, focusing on conflating project or nonprofit names with parts of government (i.e., name-synchronization) to, probably, catch the public off-guard which sector in fact they are dealing with — and to provide a “unified front” under similar names:   “Surrounded!!”  Program saturation by sound byte, etc.  Public relations/Advertising techniques….

[I’d show this, but I haven’t got laptop to talk to iCloud Photo properly yet.  The images aren’t transferred here yet…][End, Sept. 16, 2019 post-publication insert commentary.//LGH]

More, regarding why, perhaps, current Family Court Reform Practice doesn’t even acknowledge blueprints or builders exist:

Business names (association with a university or medical/health system also seems to add to the credibility) of any reformers and alleged** paradigm-changers. Referencing them as nonprofits which have tax-filings (and showing them) might reveal just how many are filing Form 990-Ns or Form 990-EZs to camouflage just how small, really and historically, they have been and still are.

**The overarching paradigm remains public-private-partnerships, no matter what marketed in its various parts, here, as  enhancements, solutions, or fixing flawed/unenlightened by the latest “science” (trauma, child development, domestic violence-related, father-engagement, etc.) practices. These PP partnerships can then, incrementally, steer change in the predetermined directions, once connected to “the grid” of decisionmaking on where public resources are spent. Personal associations, connections, and group loyalty are also developed through conferencing, publishing, etc. on each new field, or tweak to established fields…

Drawing attention to the builders organized as nonprofits and issuing “blueprints” reveals that the builders exist and organized (coordinate) as nonprofits; it also put names, dates, places, and potentially funding amount specifics, and how sources of that funding (where federal (the US) or lower-level (state, county, etc.) governments just might be part of the problem.

Remember also that “donated use of services and facilities” is a form of funding.  Nonprofits + nonprofits + nonprofits in owned privately (or, county-) owned real estate, within the shelter movement or the foster care provision of services.  One entity holds the property, another, the debt, another takes the government grants, and good luck tracking which one is which from just a public-access website.

For example, below, I show that a Model Family Court Act of 1959 was drafted by two well-known, USA nonprofits both with the word “National” in their chosen business name; a business name which by definition must be incorporated in a specific jurisdiction (US: State, territory or D.C. and thus is NOT “national” except probably in intent to control operations nationally.  I discuss that in an inset below.

Calling attention to nonprofits AS nonprofits might just blow the whole scheme — and how many subsidiary schemes, it remains to be seen — wide open, show who’s apparently been fronting for whom, who’s been playing the role of “distract and derail,” and for some reason (why?) in particular would show up the historic shenanigans of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (sic) while its buddy (but supposed “opponent”) National Council of Family and Juvenile Courts successfully becomes a global (UN) consultant, just this past August…

If the troubles in the family court were ever properly connected between the existing nonprofits running them, taking business off them, and running TRAININGS for them, it most likely would highlight how the smaller, more recent ones (whether from Northern California or Washington D.C. area) pretend to be driving a real wedge in operations by talking FOR DECADES! about “parental alienation” as THE primary problem are, in fact, probably not acting in good faith or even sincerely, though it’s definitely hard to see this from listening to them or reading their writings — unless you also know what types of information (and points of reference) are CONSISTENTLY omitted and have been for so many years.  

So, instead of honest and fair talk about the builders, their blueprints, or change agents actual fiscal entities and filings, IN THE MEDIA and ON MOST WEBSITES, we get instead talk of programming, impact, evaluation, evidence-based, promising-practices and other marketing (constant!) of “hope for the future” and supposed “remorse for the past” where applicable.  

We get endless “bread and circuses…” tales of gladiatorial courage and high-profile bloodshed and drama (or, I should say especially “trauma”) of the domestic violence with spell-binding (anonymized, often) story lines, punctuated by the usual “this program needs better oversight” headlines…. Shakespeare might’ve been impressed…

So, in that August 29, 2019, post I said, “Look, there were builders, for FIRST look for the blueprints, THEN figure out what went astray from them before ramming through expensive, or rights-compromising, power-consolidating, extra administrative bureaucracy-creating “fixes.”

And I challenged the assumption that family courts had ever expressed ANY duty to protect children as a guiding principle or reason for their origination.  Think about it, for once (!!):  If that WAS the purpose, then what were child welfare (dependency) courts and hearings for?  If the family courts now have that job, then is the general idea to make EVERY divorce or child custody/visitation dispute a potential substitute place to rule on issues involving crimes such as child abuse (and domestic violence) and suggest treatments and referrals rather than punishments with sentencing guidelines and for already identified crimes)?  And if that’s NOT the idea, then what IS the main idea/driving ideology behind family courts — and how legitimate was that idea in the first place?

For some states, I’d already found and blogged this (Maryland, Kentucky, and progressive California court consolidation under the California Judicial Council in more detail); but this time I found on-line summarizing the history of family court establishment nationwide as part of a 1997 state-level, DHS/Supreme-Court Commissioned feasibility study for Ohio themed: “Should we start them here too?  Well, let’s ask the nonprofits who’ve been sponsoring this in other states….”  That find is mostly what this post deals with, and it can only address parts of it within just one post.

There are other filings where this was found.  Not within the scope of this post, though.  Just look under the main domain name for more.

Ohio Family Court Feasibility Study (1997) (pdf is 129pp), for my 14Sept2019 post Builders and their Blueprints: Who, Really, Designed the Family Courts, (link ends ‘aI6″), upcoming.

As you can see (click through), no cover page is attached to this document.  It just starts out with “Chapter 1: History of the Family Court Movement and Literature Review: Background.”

It’s 129 pages long, with as you see in the image, an informal header (compare to how a law  or other academic journal might do this:  publication, date, title would be on every header or footer.  So while the URL makes it clear the source IS at the supreme court, authorship and publisher is not shown on every page, making it despite length, who it’s for, and all the footnotes, somewhat informal.)

How this fits into my 2019 blogging theme:

Most years as a blogger I have a certain overall theme or basic research question which often has been bugging me for a long time but which I just decide to get answered that year.  The questions usually have some major ramifications depending on how they’re answered, which the motto “Suppose I’m Right Here — What Would You Do?” as part of the blog motto indicates.

My over-arching research theme this year, 2019, was whether, if you removed a certain mysteriously absent in some circles (contexts, discussions, publications) and present in others (other context, discussions, publications) USA-based multidisciplinary (including judges), international, family-conflict-resolution-themed, and mysteriously mobile** nonprofit from the equation, we’d ever even have had family courts to start with in this country.

I have a strong hunch, and partial (more than hunch) awareness, but I believe if proved could upend current family court reform and, possibly, clear the air enough that actual solutions to stopping the roadkill and outrageous violation of due process in the courts. I have no question that the current efforts are not in good faith in that they entail censorship of shared knowledge from the general public which, if known, would upend the policy-setting now in place.

On seeing that “Ohio Family Court Feasibility Study (1997)” (<~the same link), I knew it had to be handled in its own post. This post I first drafted around August 19, set aside for a bit, and I am returning to it right after September 11.

This next image (annotated quote from the study) mentions three nonprofits and how many states were “operating or seriously considering [establishing] family courts” as surprisingly low. It also mentions by name three among “a number of national organizations“** who were, in 1997 supported moving [moving whom or what, the document describes] towards family courts.

** I have three comments (all in smaller font, as insets) on this one image, below it.  The longest of those is the one which sunk in last (as the other was more obvious).  The falsehood by using the word  label “national organization.”  The other two comment on the three organizations named, and on the wording which is itself a little evasive as to actual number of the very thing they are reporting on!

1997 OHIO FAMILY COURT FEASIBILITY STUDY (annotated by LGH), ‘three nat’l orgs,’ ‘by 1996’ || Refs FNs 9-15|| NCJFCJ, ABA & AFCC || Sshot 2019Aug17 Sat

Assuming this is true, why would the ABA, the NCJFCJ, and the AFCC** be so interested in moving towards family courts for treatment of “deviant” behavior, and in consolidating decision-making over families, the deviant with the non-deviant behavior?

Ahem! (habitual) USE OF MISLEADING VOCABULARY ABOVE MAY SHOW INTENT TO MISLEAD!

This study (incidentally, commissioned from one source, but conducted by an arm of the “NCJFCJ” referenced above based in nearby (to Ohio — not Nevada where NCJFCJ is based!) Pennsylvania, the “NCJJ.”

Somehow the Supreme Court of Ohio, the Ohio Department of Human Services, obviously the NCJFCJ and the ABA know about the existence, purposes, membership, probably conferences and also if they have any smarts, the basic operations (sources of revenues) of the AFCC.

But somehow, this organization is NOT referenced by the Family Court Reform (loose) coalitions when it reasonably might be — for example, when citing repeatedly in footnotes, professionals whose historic involvement with AFCC are easily shown, sometimes from their own resumes, or from “Members” sections of the organization’s many conferences held over the years.

Government-funded  DV or FV prevention nonprofits and those working alongside them or as members, also rarely mention the AFCC, and do not call attention to nonprofits as nonprofits taking government funds, while soliciting funds themselves…

But as I’ve continually shown, groups like DVLEAP (started about 2003 at George Washington University in DC School of Law based), for that matter the FVAPlaw.org (Family Violence Appellate Project, Inc. started 2012 at UCBerkeley Law School based originally), LeadershipCouncil.org The Leadership Council on Child Abuse & Interpersonal Violence (which at least shows a Pennsylvania street address), most if not ALL of the statewide domestic violence coalitions receiving HHS funding (directly:  formula block grants every year), financially one of the largest domestic violence organizations (San Francisco home base:  Futures without Violence, formerly “endabuse.org” or the Family Violence Prevention Fund), California’s own statewide designated coalition (now called, after some mergers and name changes, CPEDV.org “California Partnership to End Domestic Violence“) will talk content and psychological theory, empirical evidence and argue “parental alienation” and what judges just don’t understand all day/decade long and somehow manage not to mention AFCC in the body text OR in the footnotes, while continually citing known members works…  Are they members too?

I recently reviewed the DC Coalition Against Domestic Violence website (“DCCADV.org, not to be confused with DCADV.org which is for Delaware) which lists member organizations) as well as their Form 990.  I learned that DVLEAP was considered a member.  Then again, that coalition isn’t a member organization.  I also looked for but was completely unable to find evidence that a different named member (bottom row: William Kellibrew Foundation) existed as a business entity, although it was characterized (loosely) as if it were one.  This is the link to the list of “16 nonprofit organizations” and shows 15 of them)

I think most people will be surprised at how few and how recent specialized family courts and the family law codes (and everything else!) to go with them in the USA are, although obviously people have been getting married and divorced for decades and “no-fault divorce,” depending on which state you’re referring to, since as early as 1970.

Family courts are so recent that some of the original, early builders though old(!) are even still alive and at least two of the organizations associated with starting and running them started only in the mid-1970s.

So, this post is:

My recent find names three specific “organizations” as particularly behind the drafting of proposed model legislation for family courts (nationwide).  One of the so-called organizations listed wasn’t an organization, but part of the US Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS.”),which is unfortunate (? or negligent, or just mis-leading) in  any writers charged with assessing something so important:  failing to distinguish private from public when deciding, “should THIS state set up family courts too?”).  The other two, I’d already tagged and had been following.

Here is that study:   Family Court Feasibility Study

Though these three images (dated Aug. 17 on my notes) are heavily marked up, look for Footnote 7 for what I just referenced.  (One image holds that context; the other holds that footnote.  Anything NOT in black and white is my commenting).  Please notice on the first image:  The NCJFCJ, the ABA, and (I underlined in red) the AFCC (written out).  The “AFCC” written out is followed by a Footnote 15 which reads:

Milne, A. “Considerations in Establishing a Unified Family Court,” statement submitted to the U.S. Commission on Child and Family Welfare, April 19, 1995.

In other words, in the lead-up to welfare reform. (Anne Milne’s association with AFCC well known)

The second image (of three-image gallery just below), I comment on the numbers (not so large as it may seem), and the third, I remind us that where you see “NCJJ,” that’s in effect, “NCJFCJ” because NCJJ is NOT a separate entity!  Thus when a footnote alternates citations of them as if they were more than one, it’s reflecting more diversity than exists.  What’s more, the NCJFCJ, funded (I looked again before this post) at about $10-$12M a year in “government grants,” is government dependent.  Literally, it’s nationalizing the familly courts.

Other organizations featured in this one document, I’ve also noticed separately mostly for their filing behavior, history, or odd self-descriptions.  For example, the “NCCD” (National Council on Crime and Delinquency) definitely searchable on this blog and I’ve probably hashtagged it on Twitter too) per California under “government grants” lists — astonishingly — grants from around the world, as well as across the United States!  That was a new one on me!

It also originated with clear planning from the start (and under a different name) as an association of probation officers in the early 1900s.  Also mentioned are the NCSC (Virginia) and others, if you follow this blog, you’ll recognize.

From the Ohio 1997 Feasibility Study, page 6 – 7, we see in 1959 a task force within what later (?) became the NCCD (but was then focused more on probation) collaborated, it says, with the NCJFCJ to produce a Model Act:

…A model for family court reform was published in 1959 by a Committee on the Standard Family Court Act of the National Probation and Parole Association (later the National Council on Crime and Delinquency) ||page break before the word “Delinquency; I’ve included the first page’s footnotes in this quote, below|| in cooperation with the National Council of Juvenile Court Judges (later the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges) and the U.S. Children’s Bureau. The underlying rationale for the Standard Family Court act was framed as follows:

[no gap in quote, I highlit the quote yellow. Please also notice the two organizations and one federal agency sub-division involved. HHS as we now know it only dates to 1980, so this was probably “Health, Education and Welfare.”  The origins of the NCJFCJ logically didn’t include  the two words “and Family” until such courts and their judges were normalized…  This was also before no-fault divorce was first allowed but the concept of national councils setting model acts to structure the courts, obviously was already in process…]

The purpose of a family court…is to protect and safeguard family life in general, and family units in particular, by affording to family members all possible help in resolving their justiciable problems and conflicts arising from their inter-personal relationships, in a single court with one specially-qualified staff, under one leadership, with a common purpose, working as a unit, with one set of family records all in one place, under the direction of one or more specially-qualified judges.25  Prominent in the Act were discussions of serving the “best interests of the family unit,” and conserving marriage, if possible.

21. Shepherd, R. “The Unified Family Court: An Idea Whose Time Has Come.” Criminal Justice, vol. 8, 1993.
22. Hurst, Jr., H. and Szymanski, L. “Family Courts in the United States, 1996: Statutes, Court Rule, and Practice Analysis.” Pittsburgh, PA: National Center for Juvenile Justice, 1996.
23. Rubin, T. and Flango, V. Court Coordination of Family Cases. Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts, 1992.
24. Szymanski, L.; Homisak, T., and Hurst, H. “Policy Alternatives and Current Court Practice in the Special Problem Areas of Jurisdiction Over the Family.” Pittsburgh, PA: National Center for Juvenile Justice, 1993.

On a closer read (more recently) of this 1997 Feasibility Study, I noticed how frequently the “NCJJ” (see above example) was referenced in the document.  Understandable as it conducted the study…. Only it’s not an “it” — NCJFCJ is the “it” wherever “NCJJ” is seen.

This is similar, but in the domestic violence field, to how for many years, “BWJP” (Battered Women’s Justice Project) was referred to as an “it” until it finally became one, ca. Sept. 2011.

Before then, it was a project of a nonprofit in Duluth, Minnesota, also primarily dependent on government grants for its work. BWJP wasn’t located, at the time, in Minnesota, either, but shared a website with a different, smaller, nonprofit in an Eastern seaboard state (possibly Pennsylvania, or perhaps DC; I DNR which offhand), while its ownership was in Duluth.  BWJP (like NCJFCJ and at least in 1983, the NCSC) worked with AFCC, all the while using misleading names about its own identity.

On yet a closer look, I found frequent quotes and references to a non-entity spoken of, though technically not claimed as one, throughout.  This isn’t apparent unless one’s aware of the various organizations some of their leaders, and what’s not being mentioned on the publication. I’d already profiled and posted repeatedly on the odd reporting by and about this non-entity “NCJJ” as far back as 2016 and how there are major problems with honesty and transparency built into this one (image below references just two post titles referencing it):

This “Ohio Family Court Feasibility” document is 129 pages long.

Within it, there are 17 uses of “National Center for Juvenile Justice (written out) among them 5,12, 22, 24,42, 48.** and 6 uses of the abbreviated “NCJJ.”  The phrase was used also in the text, starting with Chapter 2.

Although Chapter 1 references who commissioned the study, it doesn’t mention that the study was in fact done by  an out-of-state center (in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) owned wholly by a nonprofit in Nevada (NCJFCJ).  It’s also referenced in the final chapter.   (**Actually footnotes may start over with new chapters.  I simply did a word-search on the pdf). Also be aware of that Journal of Juvenile Justice (where quoted) is NCJFCJ’s journal.

The “unified jurisdiction” “one-presiding judge” theme shown from the start promoted by these organizations:

The concept of assigning one judge to hear all matters involving a family is a frequently espoused goal of the family court movement. Please see Linda Szymanski, Policy Alternatives and Current Court Practice in the Special Problem Areas of Jurisdiction Over the Family, National Center for Juvenile Justice, Pittsburgh, PA, 1993.

TO REVIEW:

My recent find wasn’t a recent publication, I just found it recently, along with some others nearby which validate what I’ve been saying, for years now:  government  (at least judging by the continuing re-organization of the courts — a major part of any level of government! —  is being organized from outside the normal processes and its processes and programs applied on the public, reversing the concept of representation of the public.

Whether the applications are good or not so good isn’t the main point. That private collaborations network to control entire systems, with no end in sight to what can be funneled through their developed networks (communication and collaboration pipelines) and apparently, no limit on how many jurisdictions or geopolitical borders they cross, is!

This undermining of jurisdiction and the effectiveness of geopolitical (national, and within the USA, state, borders) process through perpetually-created crises has been taking place for at least a century, (For example, on the RIIA-CFR topic: Think Tanks and Power in Foreign Policy pp 189-214,CFR-RIIA Interconnections: A Transnational Ruling Class, Liberal Atlantic Community or Anglo-American Establishment? by Inderjeet Parmar, (“Chatham House” referring to the RIIA factor).

I could post several other links; some might alienate readers, but this one being posted in Springer, at least shows how some of the connectivity occurs.  This is exactly the type of connectivity also shown (internationally, and across state borders where it comes to the USA) on handling of specific custody, divorce, child support, child protection, protection of women (specifically) from violence, domestic violence prevention (and “treatment”!) and so forth.  That is,…organized from outside in within think-tank, subject-matter specified nonprofits, networks A, B, C, and D…. and then these self-congratulate themselves (in public) for getting along with each other despite having from the start members in common; they continue to hold conferences in remote  (to “those governed” and to be affected by policies), privately-guarded conference places (Wingspread, Racine, Wisconsin; St. George’s (Windsor Castle, UK); Marbach Castle in (Switzerland or Germany forget which; I’ve posted), or in Canada, in the Caribbean, etc.

Or policies are set from sponsored university centers whose finances cannot be traced; the collaborating professionals go international, having already their faculty or academic salaries, and being published, quote and stage mock-battles (I’ll say at this point) with each other to distract attention from exactly how they are organized.

Think Tanks and Power in Foreign Policy pp 189-214,CFR-RIIA Interconnections: A Transnational Ruling Class, Liberal Atlantic Community or Anglo-American Establishment? by Inderjeet Parmar,  

ABSTRACT:

The CFR and Chatham House were not only intimately connected with a myriad of national establishment societies and organisations, as indicated in Chapter 2, but also with one another. This chapter aims to examine the extent and nature of such interconnections from 1919 to 1945. It will be seen that the connections between the two internationalist think tanks were many and varied, ranging from personal correspondence, cooperation in publishing and disseminating literature, exchanges and other visits, joint international conferences and study groups. In addition, of course, they were founded at the same meetings at Paris in 1919–20 and, during the 1920s through the Great Depression to the end of the Second World War, they were financially sustained by the great American philanthropic foundations.** However loosely, then, it may be claimed that the leaders of the two think tanks were components of an Anglo-American ‘establishment’.

but family courts (apparently also in the UK) are a more recent phenomena.  Nor did they just develop.  They were pushed, propounded, promoted, and strategically set up, with proposed model legislation, and in fact more from the top down and outside in (of each state) then from the ground up.

To understand this we can’t focus on just single jurisdictions, or single organizations, or just a few within parts of a network spanning different continents, not just states with the USA or countries within North America.  To understand this, it does not make sense to speak in primarily generic labels (‘fathers’ rights’ or ‘child abuse,’ ‘domestic violence prevention’) when more specifics exist:  such as the names of the networked organizations, and identifiable, measurable characteristics of each, to be verified from public access database, i.e., sources. Even when they are in flux, these data sources can be looked up, “unearthed” if necessary, and compared.

The concept of “builders of these courts” has been for me a topic of interest and exploration since at least as far back as 2009, by which year the personal devastation experienced post-DV, by way of […see list below!..] was effectively (I thought at the time) accomplished.  Finished.  Done with, so that I could move on in life…

As it turns out, and as our situation turned out (some, not all, do continue what seems like endlessly) the ordeal was only about halfway over, even though by one child had just turned adult, after which I was informed their Dad had, admitted to abandoning our adolescent children in the household to which they’d been overnight shifted.  It seems the mutual-benefit relationship with the involved woman, had run out of benefits on her part, or his, or both  he was thrown out of (her) house.  The year that I found out, this was then used as an opportunity for him to seek to re-gain entrance somehow into MY life (i.e., claim me as his God-given wife, again): More than disturbing and alarming in context. ******

If you think about it, it’d be hard to design any system more effective a dismantling and destroying families interfering, despite the title “PRWORA” (Personal Right to Work and Opportunity Reconciliation Act) which plays such a key, and coinciding role with the expansion of family court operations nationwide) with people’s right to work free from abuse, ability to safely continue raising children after having separated from it, and retain or rebuild any ongoing toe-hold or foot-holds in life itself, while dealing with litigation which goes on for YEARS, as anyone can bring a “cause of action” in these courts for almost anything, and each time the family “twitches” it responds by ordering the consumption of more services.

Unless we need them to “twitch” and return stolen children, or protect them.

My understanding of the system is that it is a potent weapon which can be aimed at almost anyone (though generically, the are aimed at castigation single and “unwed” mothers; the public policy literature of the 1990s forward is clear on this).  It very possibly could be used for political reasons entirely unrelated to the family’s or anyone in it’s behavior towards the other family members (i.e., assets stripping, or even physical elimination) or it could be used for the convenience of acquiring assets of families who are identified as having some — the involved generation, or their parents’ — and in doing so attracts the worst, not the best, of humanity to oversee and administer the proceedings, and take a cut in fees.

The family court systems in the larger public-policy (i.e., federal, not just state as to the USA) is not only sexist but also racist: obsessed from the start with tracking divorcing parents by ethnicity, and social scientists presiding as the “public benefit” sector experts are still doing so to this day.  This may not be seen directly “in your face” but can be seen in the journals and publications. Lessons apparently were learned from the 1960s to beware “in your face” racism (for the time), and to mitigate (toss some coins / scraps towards) the sexism with the “violence against women” groups.

The idea that the family courts were ACTUALLY MEANT to be helpful and beneficial, but somehow went off-course, or ignorantly became clumsy and dysfunctional, resulting in UNINTENDED harm to children seems at odds not only with experienced realities but also with the history of their development and with their innate nature, which involves the addition of as many mental health professionals as each case (or the local counties) will sustain before riots break out.

The power accorded the combination of interests in the family (divorce, parenting, visitation, child support and handling criminal events (child abuse, domestic violence) in the CIVIL arena) courts can make or break any family line, just about at will.  I’m not sure whether this was intended for the more powerful family lines and just happened to affect the low-income too or whether it was a power structure intended to keep “up-and-coming” families joining the elite except by permission. One thing is clear: it’s a force to be reckoned with.

(This marks from where I’m offramping: [ANECDOTAL NARRATIVE FOOTNOTED.  Not sure why I’m wanting to say this now, many years later, still.] and [ANECDOTAL INDIGNATION: also FOOTNOTED!]  to: THIS discussion (post)!  ‘Anecdotal Narrative | Indignation (Aug. 2019) and Feelings (Sep. 2019) Footnoted (from Builders and Their Blueprints post) [started Sept. 14, 2019] (short-link ends “-b41” and the last character is a number), as also shown above where I off-ramped some later expressions.

In the process of looking for more “exhibits” to a consistent claim I’ve been making (and am confident enough having read much more than have posted on it) about the more recent establishment of the family courts under state laws, MUCH more recent than I believe most parents “going through it” now realize, I found one from 1997 which as written identifies seemingly foreign concepts to this country’s basic federal (U.S.) and state constitutions and forms of government.

On finding and reading it (and it is shown below), I knew a personal “time-out” was needed.  It was indeed upsetting, but beyond that, I still knew on finding it, important to publicize that by admission (at least here), family court divisions have NOT always been around. To get them set up required coordinated promotion by, as I’ve uncovered over the years and blogged, those who would be running them, or taking business referrals from them once set up.

By “those” you may be thinking specific individuals, whether judges, legislators, or lawyers.  Specific individuals are usually involved in any organization or movement, but it’s the organizations and associations I believe must be watched more closely, and as to their parts in the larger landscape over time.

You might call what I’m seeing, and as described in this short, 1997 document, particularly with attention to its many footnotes, “government NOT of, by or for “the people,” but by and for through privately networked corporations (many, not all nonprofit) usurping the communications between government and those governed WITHIN their state, county, or even national jurisdictions, and pushing the boundaries of subject matter jurisdiction. (As I said in a later introduction to this post above…)

My first draft of this post talks in detail about those two topics, posting and looking up more specific names.  Perhaps half the size of the post. To distinguish it from references more directly about family courts and this feasibility study, I’m calling this section:

Usurping communications between government and the governed, pushing the boundaries of subject matter  (and geopolitical) jurisdiction.

This was on my mind heavily before diving further into the feasibility study, so I put this on the post before much of what you see above.  Still related, still interesting, still current and important information to know!

Usurping communications between government and the governed, pushing the boundaries of subject matter  (and geopolitical) jurisdiction.

Discussion (and images, links, quotes, mini-biographies and time-lines of certain mentors/key influential figures)

Caught! Chronically Usurping Communication btw. Government and the Governed, Pushing Back Legal Boundaries Set by Subject Matter and Geopolitical (State and National Borders), Undermining, basically, The USA (Sept. 14, 2019)  (“-b4j”, about 5,000 words only: can you believe it?).

(I may leave one larger set of tags across two or three related posts this time…)

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