Children's Property Rights

Factual Questions
21

Technically, no- the federal government coerced the states into doing it, since they couldn’t do it themselves.

What happened was that under the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984, the Feds told the states that if they didn’t raise the drinking age to 21 they wouldn’t get federal highway funding (to eliminate the problem of kids driving across state lines to lower-age-limit jurisdictions, then driving back while drunk).

IIRC, Louisiana was the last state that held out (but has since given in).

22

Another point, same source:

http://www.illinoislegalaid.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.dsp_content&contentID=2638

So a minor *can * make a legally binding contract, but he’s got a privilege to avoid it until he turns 18 or a reasonable time after that.

23

Hmm…is it really “binding” then? Or is “binding” a specific legal term that doesn’t mean what it sounds like? (That is, that both sides are bound to the terms of the contract and can’t break it without consequences.)

24

It’s binding on the other party, but the minor can avoid it while still a minor, or for a certain time after turning 18. However, once that time passes, it’s also binding on the former minor.

25

The minor can enforce the contract against the other (non-minor) parties. The contract is voidable only if the minor wants to void it. So “legally binding” just turns out to be a bit more complicated than “binding” all by itself.

Or what **Northern Piper ** said.

26

What’s the reasoning for the “reasonable time after turning 18” part? How long is a reasonable time - the article says not more than several months? It sounds like if you sign a contract the day before your 18th birthday, you might be able to void it 2 months later, whereas if you sign it on your 18th birthday, you’re bound by it.

27

olivesmarch4th’s situation was essentially the scenario I was asking about in the OP; and I’m sorry to hear that you were in such a situation. This seems to suggest there’s more stopping a parent from selling everything a minor child ‘owns’ as a punishment for some egregious offence other than child abuse charges.

I should have distinguished better between my commentary on the news story and the actually hypothetical GQ. Obviously the situation in the news story must be legally pretty cut and dried or the headline would be a lot different. Though from what limited information is available, I do question what the mother did.

My oldest cousin, who is a nice guy, actually got himself into a very similar situation. His parents bought a brand new economy car for the kids to share, since all three of them were about to be driving age at the same time. However, my cousin had been working at his father’s business for some time, and had earned a lot of leeway from them with his performance there. So after high school graduation, when he told them he intended to move out to an apartment across the street from the local college (which he was going to attend) they let him take the new car with him, which they continued to pay for in full. His parents had a long list of requirements he had to meet though, and I know they were clear about communicating what they were and how important they considered them because I was there when they did. One of the requirements was remaining a full-time student, partly for insurance reasons. That’s where my cousin did something monumentally stupid- his grades started slipping, a lot, apparently because he was enjoying his new independence a little too much. He didn’t tell anyone about it, but let the problem get worse and worse. Eventually, he went and talked to his professors about it. Most of them recommended he drop their classes before the semester cut-off. Still not discussing it with anyone in the family, he went ahead and dropped them. Then he waited a month to tell his parents. Their response: they drove to his apartment and took the car back. Without ready transportation he was in a bad situation for some time, but I think his parents were completely in the right because A) They were paying for the car in full B) He had been straining their generosity on several fronts, some not mentioned here C) He made NO ATTEMPT to communicate his problems to them and get help or work something out until it was far too late.

All that said, again I still question what the mother from the news story did. I don’t know the son’s general behavior, and the details of their agreement and the car’s disposition aren’t available, so I can’t say how severe a punishment was in order. But: from my reading of the article, the alcohol was unopened. I believe it is strongly suggested by the article’s wording that she put the car up for sale and then told her son she had found the alcohol, which would mean she decided on a severe punishment before giving him a chance to defend himself. Furthermore, in many places automobiles are vital for transportation, and being 19 I’d like to think this woman’s son has a few places he needs to be. I don’t know what alternative transportation is available to him, or what the financial burden of maintaining the car was, but it seems very severe restrictions on the car’s use would be just as effective discipline as selling it, while still allowing the son to get things done and aquire further driving experience. Even total grounding from the vehicle can at least be reversed later on; now before he can ‘own’ a car again one has to be found for purchase. Most importantly by far though, I believe the mocking newspaper ad was totally inappropriate. Disciplining a child is not exclusive of respecting them, and publicly humiliating a 19-year-old is not contributing to his upbringing. Again, I believe she placed the ad before talking to her son about the alcohol. That’s not parenting, it’s theater.

28

Gfactor, you are correct that the law gets pretty murky in this area. I think part of my rights to my own property had to do with the fact that I wasn’t living with them at the time. It is complicated to explain, but essentially when I was 16 they rented an apartment in a neighboring town to be closer to their jobs, and I lived in the house alone and attended school while they lived in the apartment and occasionally visited the house. They were financially supporting me, but at the time I ‘‘ran away’’, it was arguable that I had actually been living with them at all for the previous year. I don’t know what the legal definition of living with your parents is. They owned the title on the house, but they physically lived in the house maybe one day a week.

I don’t know if that had any relevance to the legal facts of the case, but I do know that one of the stipulations for legal emancipation without parents’ consent is that the parents have not been financially supporting the minor in question. By then, I had a full-time job and was living with my Aunt, and could easily prove that they weren’t financially supporting me. Is it possible that property rights are decided along the same lines?

I can vouch for that one as well–because that is exactly what happened to me. My mother physically came to school and removed my driver’s license from my possession while my school counselors tried to explain to her that if I couldn’t legally drive, I couldn’t transport myself to high school and risked not graduating. She said she didn’t care whether I graduated from high school or not. This was perfectly within her legal right to do, but I don’t think it boded well for my parents in the emancipation hearing. My argument was essentially, ‘‘I want to become a legal adult because I want to get a driver’s license so I can drive to school.’’ I had a car (in my aunt’s name, as I said), but I couldn’t drive it.

Once I was an emancipated minor, I got my license back and she couldn’t say boo because I had the legal rights of an adult. By that point, the car was in my Aunt’s name–I’m not sure we ever even bothered transferring the title to my name though it would have been perfectly legal to do so. I opened my own checking account and conducted my own business and filed my own tax return as an independent from that point on-- I was about 6 months away from my 18th birthday at that time. I could do just about anything with that little slip of paper with the exception of drink, smoke, or vote.

It’s hard to know why I had the particular rights I did at that time due to the complexity of the situation. I don’t remember the technicalities all that well, only that she had just as much right to seize my driver’s license as I had to go in and take all my stuff out of the house. It sounds contradictory, I know, but that’s how it went down.

29

olivesmarch4th, that’s terrible. Were there no school buses where you were living? Not that the presence of school buses would make the confiscation of your license under those circumstances look much better. I had no idea parents were able to unilateraly seize driver’s licenses; certainly they should be able to prevent a minor in their care from driving but I would think the license itself was state property. Can they seize a diploma? A social security card? A passport? I have had friends who were resident aliens while minors; it’s scary to think their parents could have punished them by taking away their green cards.

30

And ironically the drinking age remains 18 in all overseas possesions (Puerto Rico, Guam, etc) which are the only places (other than DC) where the federal government can directly set the drinking age.

31

This just occured to me: if exchanging currency for goods and services is entering into a contract, then how are minors able to shop at stores? Wouldn’t their option to avoid contracts overrule stores’ return policies? What with the current strict policies for software I’d think this would be a major issue.

32

At the point when my license was confiscated, I had already left home, taken my own property out of the house, and was living with my aunt in a neighboring town. There were closer schools to my aunt’s house than the one I was attending, but I was only 8 months away from graduation and in order to graduate on time, I was required to continue attending the same school. By law a senior could not suddenly change schools and receive credit for that year. This is actually the issue that made me walk – my Mom got pissed because I didn’t sweep the floor often enough or something, said she was pulling me out of my high school, making me cut off contact with all of my friends and forcing me to move back in with her and my stepdad and attend school an hour away where I would have to repeat my senior year.

It seems worth mentioning that I was the school Secretary of the National Honor Society, assistant editor of the yearbook, 3rd chair trombone in symphonic band, taking two AP courses and commuting to the local college for dual enrollment credit. I had never been in trouble with the law or had any disciplinary problems outside the dimensions of my mother’s imagination… it was purely irrational whimsy on her part to pull me out of school as punishment for whatever it was she happened to decide I’d done wrong that week.

Totally unfair and irrational? Absolutely.
But she had every legal right to do it, apparently.

Just as she had the legal right to take my driver’s license.

But I had the legal right to emancipate. Heh.

33

Minors can enter into contracts for “neccesities” like food, clothing, and shelter. How electronics or jewry fit into this I’m not sure.

34

It’s a transitional period, between the time when, as a minor, you can void a contract, and when you’re of full age, and don’t have that power. What is reasonable would likely depend on the circumstances of the particular case.

35

This makes sense when you consider that under-21 Puerto Ricans and Guamanians can’t go driving across state lines to get tanked, then drive home.

The Feds didn’t care what the drinking age was, merely that everybody chose the same one, to put an end to the “bloody borders”. I imagine getting the <21 states to raise their drinking ages was easier than getting the 21-rule states to lower theirs.

36

If you really believe this was the reason for the federal legislation, I have some land in Florida I’d like you to purchase. :dubious:

37

Neither can Alaskans or Hawaiians.

38

I’d love to hear your theory.

Alaskans can, in an uppercase sense.

39

The federal government imposed a combined moral/value judgment upon the states. The authors of the bill were quite explicit in their desires: they believe that since statistics show that significant numbers of people from 18 to 21 in age will drink and drive, it is a very good idea to keep them from drinking at all, rather than trying to impose restrictions on their ability to drive. This imposed restriction is all the easier to impose given that there is still in this country an undercurrent of the same moral feelings that resulted in passage of the 18th Amendment.

The nonsense about crossing state lines is nothing but window dressing to help hang their hat on.

40

And yet the law merely restricted possession, not consumption. Assuming legislative intent followed the lines you suggest (which is admittedly plausible - we are a nation of Puritans, still) the law would explicitly outlaw consumption.