A 20-Mile 'Walk of Love' Puts the Spotlight on Loving Parents Whose Bond With Their Children Has Been Broken by Others

Wednesday August 2, 9:29 am ET

Parental Alienation Syndrome is now epidemic due to family courts, financial incentives to states and sexual bias in courts.

MIAMI, Aug. 2 /PRNewswire/ -- On July 30th, Parental Alienation Awareness (http://www.parental-alienation-awareness.com) and Three-Sides-To-Every-Story (http://www.three-sides-to-every-story.org/index.html) joined together on a 20-mile walk from Meriwether County Courthouse in Greenville, GA, to Troup County Courthouse in LaGrange, GA, to bring attention to the fact that loving parents and children were being denied access to each other as a result of interference by both individuals and family courts.

Members of Parental Alienation Awareness and Three-Sides-To-Every-Story walked from courthouse to courthouse carrying signs and banners and were escorted by local sheriff and police departments in both counties. People honked and waved, as they arrived at their destination where balloon-decorated booths were set up with information about Parental Alienation and the family court system.

Parental Alienation Awareness (http://www.parental-alienation-awareness.com) is an organization that strives to educate the public and the professionals who work with children and families of the devastating effects of Parental Alienation (PA), Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), and Hostile Aggressive Parenting (HAP). In 1994, approximately 2.4+ million North Americans obtained divorces, including the parents of more than one million children under 18. Parental Alienation is a psychological condition most often observed in children affected by high- conflict divorce. It is a result of one parent intentionally trying to hurt the other by using both overt and subtle tactics to interfere with that parent's bond with the children. Professionals disagree whether the term is Parental Alienation or Parental Alienation Syndrome; however, all agree that the problem exists and is damaging to children.

"Parental Alienation should be recognized as a form of mental and emotional child abuse," explained Sarvy Emo, co-founder of Parental Alienation Awareness. "For a parent who has been alienated from their child, the bereavement does not end," added Robin Denison, fellow co-founder.

Three-Sides-To-Every-Story is run by Georgia grandmother Bessie Hudgins, who has not seen her three beautiful granddaughters in many years. Her son is a divorced father whose ex-wife made it very difficult for him to be with his children. With the help of the family law courts, this battle has been going on for 16 years in two states and has resulted in an illegal adoption by his ex-wife's new husband. "I am missing three pieces of my heart," says "Me-Ma" Bessie.

"If we can help just one family, it will have made the blisters on my feet all worthwhile," said Denison. "Family is everything. It is the only thing that really matters," Hudgins agreed. 

    To learn more about PA, PAS, and HAP, visit
http://www.parental-alienation-awareness.com.

To learn more about a family's ongoing fight with the family court system to be able to reunite grandparents and grandchildren, visit http://www.three-sides-to-every-story.org/index.html.

 

    Photo:
    http://www.ereleases.com/pr/2006-ParentalAlienationAwareness.jpg

    Contact:

    Sarvy Emo
    Tel: 416-840-5654
    Fax: 866-232-8134
    info@parental-alienation-awareness.com
    http://www.parental-alienation-awareness.com

Rein in activist judges

 

By Tom McClusky

Judges are not above the law. Recent legislation seeking to rein in judicial activism is an effort to restrain judicial power within the limits of Constitutional design, not an attack on "judicial independence."

Coming from a family of judges, I firmly believe in judicial independence of opinions. Nonetheless, the courts should not be allowed to operate as a legislative judiciary. They are subject to the same system of checks and balances that are ever-present in the U.S. Constitution.

The power of Congress to limit jurisdiction of the courts is one of the primary checks on the power of the judiciary; it is granted in Article III, Section 2, of the Constitution. This power has been used numerous times in history by both parties, including by former minority leader Tom Daschle.

The House recently passed legislation that would remove the Pledge of Allegiance from the jurisdiction of the federal courts in response to a lower court's ruling — twice— that the phrase "under God" is unconstitutional. If, at some future date, the American people believe that recognizing God is offensive, then Congress can strip the phrase from the pledge. But this decision should be made by the American people through the democratic process, not arbitrarily by activists dressed in black robes.

Also, an independent judiciary should not be immune from the nation's laws. A South Dakota ballot initiative would ensure that judges engaged in misconduct from the bench are held accountable. In Congress, House Judiciary Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., has introduced a bill to create an independent inspector general, appointed by the Supreme Court's chief justice in consultation with Congress, to root out waste and abuse.

The non-profit Community Rights Counsel found that from 2002 through 2004, 160 federal judges attended 331 junkets, financed by private interests. To ensure impartiality and independence, an inspector general within the judiciary branch would be able to hold judges to a universal standard to which all public servants should be held.

Judicial independence of opinions is a sacred foundation of government, but a court system answerable to no one dangerously weakens that foundation.

Tom McClusky is the Family Research Council's vice president for government affairs.