Beagle v. Beagle

Citation678 So.2d 1271
Decision Date22 August 1996
Docket NumberNo. 85971,85971
Parties21 Fla. L. Weekly S340 Dewey Keith BEAGLE, et al., Petitioners, v. Roy Thomas BEAGLE, et al., Respondents.
CourtUnited States State Supreme Court of Florida

Wm. J. Sheppard and Richard W. Smith of Sheppard and White, P.A., Jacksonville, and

Stephen Donohoe, Jacksonville, for Petitioners.

Nancy N. Nowlis, Jacksonville, for Respondents.

Ross Baer, Sue-Ellen Kenny and Jeanine Germanowicz, West Palm Beach, for amicus curiae, Sayge Schreckengost and Scott Schreckengost and The Legal Aid Society of Palm Beach County, Inc.

Andrew H. Kayton, Legal Director, Miami, for amicus curiae, American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Florida.

OVERTON, Justice.

We have for review Beagle v. Beagle, 654 So.2d 1260 (Fla. 1st DCA 1995), concerning the sensitive family law issue of grandparental visitation rights. Specifically, we address only the 1993 amendment to section 752.01 of the Florida Statutes. Prior to such modification, the statute at issue allowed the award of grandparental visitation in four other distinct family situations. The constitutionality of those four paragraphs is not at issue in this proceeding. We limit our holding to only those situations in which a child is living with both natural parents, at least one natural parent objects to grandparental visitation, and no relevant matters are pending in the court system. See 752.01(1)(e), Fla. Stat. (1995). In such cases, we find that a judge cannot impose grandparental visitation upon an intact family. We emphasize that our determination today is not a comment on the desirability of interaction between grandparents and their grandchildren. We focus exclusively on whether it is proper for the government, in the absence of a demonstrated harm to the child, to force such interaction against the express wishes of at least one parent in an intact family.

The relevant paragraph is challenged as violative of the privacy guarantees in both the Florida Constitution and the United States Constitution. The First District Court of Appeal concluded that the paragraph did not offend either constitution. The district court did, however, certify the following as being a question of great public importance:

IS SECTION 752.01(1)(e), FLORIDA STATUTES (1993), FACIALLY UNCONSTITUTIONAL BECAUSE IT CONSTITUTES IMPERMISSIBLE STATE INTERFERENCE WITH PARENTAL RIGHTS PROTECTED BY EITHER ARTICLE I, SECTION 23, OF THE FLORIDA CONSTITUTION OR THE DUE PROCESS CLAUSE OF THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT TO THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION?

Id. at 1263. We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. Const. For the reasons expressed, we disagree with the district court majority and answer the certified question in the affirmative. We find that the challenged paragraph infringes upon the rights of parents to raise their children free from government intervention. The paragraph's major flaw is its failure to require a showing of harm to the child prior to any award of any grandparental visitation rights. The absence of such harm requirement results in the State being unable to satisfy the compelling interest standard announced by our decisions construing article I, section 23, of the Florida Constitution. Consequently, section 752.01(1)(e) must be stricken as facially unconstitutional. Our resolution of this issue under the Florida Constitution moots the federal claim. We emphasize that the inadequacy of the best interest test in this limited circumstance does not change or modify existing principles regarding the use of that test in other family law contexts.

History

Before proceeding, we briefly outline the historical development of the Florida grandparental visitation statute. First, in 1978, the legislature modified section 61.13(2)(b) of the Florida Statutes. The relevant language read:

The court may award the grandparents visitation rights of a minor children [sic] if it is deemed by the court to be in the child's best interest. Nothing in this section shall be construed to require that grandparents be made parties or given notice of dissolution pleadings or proceedings, nor shall such grandparents have legal standing as "contestants" as defined in s. 61.1306.

§ 61.13(2)(b), Fla. Stat. (Supp.1978). The modification quoted above was not the only action concerning grandparental visitation rights taken by the legislature in 1978. The following, contained in section 68.08, was also enacted:

Any court of this state which is competent to decide child custody matters shall have jurisdiction to award the grandparents of a minor child or minor children visitation rights of the minor child or children upon the death of or desertion by one of the minor child's parents if it is deemed by the court to be in the minor child's best interest.

§ 68.08, Fla. Stat. (Supp.1978).

Second, in 1984 the legislature consolidated the grandparental visitation provisions in chapter 752 of the Florida Statutes. That chapter was titled "Grandparental Visitation Rights." It included a procedure for the granting of grandparental visitation rights in situations: (1) where one or both parents of the child are deceased, 1 (2) where the marriage of the child's parents has been dissolved, 2 or (3) where a parent of the child has deserted the child. 3 Further, the legislature explicitly limited the chapter by refusing to extend its scope to situations in which a child is adopted unless the adoption is by a stepparent. 4

Third, in 1990, the legislature added guidelines with which the courts might determine the best interest of the child. 5 In that same year, the legislature added a section that requires mediation, if such services are available in a given circuit, in cases where families cannot internally resolve their differences and a petition for grandparental visitation rights is filed. 6

Finally, in 1993, the challenged paragraph was added authorizing the award of grandparental visitation rights in situations where the child lives within an intact family. 7 For a full understanding of the challenged paragraph, we set forth subsection one in its entirety with the challenged paragraph underlined.

(1) The court shall, upon petition filed by a grandparent of a minor child, award reasonable visitation rights of visitation to the grandparent with respect to the child when it is in the best interest of the minor child if:

(a) One or both parents of the child are deceased;

(b) The marriage of the parents of the child has been dissolved;

(c) A parent of the child has deserted the child;

(d) The minor child was born out of wedlock and not later determined to be a child born within wedlock as provided in s. 742.091; or

(e) The minor is living with both natural parents who are still married to each other whether or not there is a broken relationship between either or both parents of the minor child and the grandparents, and either or both parents have used their parental authority to prohibit a relationship between the minor child and the grandparents.

752.01(1), Fla. Stat. (1995)(emphasis added).

Facts

The facts in this case are simple. Roy and Sharron Beagle (the grandparents) filed a petition in the trial court for visitation rights with their granddaughter, Amber Beagle (the child). Dewey and Melissa Beagle (the parents) opposed the award of visitation rights and moved to dismiss the grandparents' petition. At the time of the grandparents' petition, the parents were living together with the child as an intact family. The trial court granted the parents' motion to dismiss, finding that section 752.01(1)(e) violated the parents' right to privacy under article I, section 23, of the Florida Constitution. The district court of appeal reversed. It relied heavily on its prior decision in Sketo v. Brown, 559 So.2d 381 (Fla. 1st DCA 1990). In Sketo, the district court addressed the paragraph in the grandparental visitation statute that allows an award of grandparental visitation rights in situations where a parent is deceased. In that case, the district court ruled that the paragraph at issue was not violative of article I, section 23 of the Florida Constitution. In upholding the challenged paragraph in this case, the district court ruled that there was no reason to assume that intact families were more deserving of constitutional privacy protections than were those families that were not intact. Specifically, it reasoned:

When we consider that the justification for Florida's grandparent visitation statute is the best interest of the child, it seems to us that it matters little whether the child whose interest is to be protected lives in a loving, nurturing home with both parents, a loving home headed by a working mother whose erstwhile husband has deserted the family or with a loving father devastated by a divorce not of his asking. Article I, Section 23 protects the privacy rights of each of these family units in precisely the same way. None of these loving parents is more or less equal than any other and none is entitled to more or less privacy protection than are the others.

Beagle, 654 So.2d at 1263. Accordingly, the district court extended the Sketo reasoning and found the challenged paragraph constitutional. Judge Webster concurred, noting that he was constrained by the district court's holding in Sketo. He noted, however, that he would prefer to recede from the Sketo decision. He would hold that "the statute at issue here violates both article I, section 23, of the Florida Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution." Beagle, 654 So.2d at 1263 (Webster, J., concurring).

Other Jurisdictions

At the outset, it must be acknowledged that Florida is not the only jurisdiction in which the issue of grandparental visitation rights has been contested. To the contrary, there are divergent views in other jurisdictions as to whether the government can constitutionally infringe upon the rights of parents to raise their children. For instance, in Brooks v. Parkerson, ...

To continue reading

Request your trial
114 cases
  • Mallick v. Mallick
    • United States
    • Florida District Court of Appeals
    • 16 Octubre 2020
    ...court was required to balance the mother's "longstanding and fundamental liberty interest" in rearing her children, Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So. 2d 1271, 1275 (Fla. 1996) (quoting Padgett v. Dep't of Health & Rehab. Servs., 577 So. 2d 565, 570 (Fla. 1991) ), against the legislature's directive......
  • Roth v. Weston
    • United States
    • Connecticut Supreme Court
    • 29 Enero 2002
    ...with parental rights, provided the petitioner has established a parent-like relationship with the child. See Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So. 2d 1271, 1275-77 (Fla. 1996) (state can satisfy compelling interest required under state constitution when acting to prevent harm); Brooks v. Parkerson, sup......
  • Blixt v. Blixt
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court
    • 9 Septiembre 2002
    ...348 Ark. 322, 352 (2002); Roth v. Weston, supra at 205-206; Von Eiff v. Azicri, 720 So. 2d 510, 514 (Fla. 1998); Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So. 2d 1271, 1276 (Fla. 1996); Brooks v. Parkerson, 265 Ga. 189, 193, 194, cert. denied, 516 U.S. 942 (1995); Wickham v. Byrne, 199 111. 2d 309, 317 (2002);......
  • D.M.T. v. T.M.H.
    • United States
    • Florida Supreme Court
    • 12 Diciembre 2013
    ...is “one of the basic civil rights of man” and is “fundamental to the very existence and survival of the race”); Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So.2d 1271, 1276 (Fla.1996) (recognizing that parents' fundamental right to raise their children is protected by Florida's state constitutional right of priv......
  • Request a trial to view additional results
5 books & journal articles
  • Defamation & privacy
    • United States
    • James Publishing Practical Law Books Florida Causes of Action
    • 1 Abril 2022
    ...LLC v. State , 210 So.3d 1243, 1252-53 (Fla. 2017); Von Eiff v. Azicri, 720 So.2d 510, 514 (Fla. 1998). See Also 1. Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So.2d 1271, 1275 (Fla. 1996) (“The right of privacy is a fundamental right which we believe demands the compelling state interest standard. This test shi......
  • Privileges
    • United States
    • James Publishing Practical Law Books Florida Family Law Trial Notebook
    • 30 Abril 2022
    ...visitation over objection of one or both parents in intact marriage is unconstitutional as an invasion of privacy. Beagle v. Beagle , 678 So.2d 1271 (Fla. 1996). PRIVILEGES 10-33 Privileges 10.15 Compton v. West Volusia Hospital Authority The court erred in requiring production of an unpubl......
  • No More Secret Adoptions: Providing Unwed Biological Fathers with Actual Notice of the Florida Putative Father Registry
    • United States
    • Capital University Law Review No. 37-2, December 2008
    • 1 Diciembre 2008
    ...Inc. v. State, 866 So. 2d 612, 619, 634 (Fla. 2003) (quoting In re T.W., 551 So. 2d 1186, 1192 (Fla. 1989)). 235 See Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So. 2d 1271, 1275 (Fla. 1996). 2008] NO MORE SECRET ADOPTIONS 489 substantial relationship with his child. 236 This opportunity cannot be summarily term......
  • Grandparents have rights after all: no area of custody law is more fraught with conflict between the rights of a child and the legal rights of a parent than the area of third party custody involving grandparents.
    • United States
    • Florida Bar Journal Vol. 76 No. 1, January 2002
    • 1 Enero 2002
    ...hand of government paternalism which is protected by the federal and state constitutions." U.S.C.A. Const. Amend. 14; Beagle v. Beagle, 678 So. 2d 1271 (Fla. 1996). The Florida Supreme Court in Beagle found that [section] 752.01(1)(e) was facially unconstitutional because it infringed upon ......
  • Request a trial to view additional results
1 provisions

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT