Author Description

Family law is an interdisciplinary area, and the materials in this work reflect the numerous disciplines influencing this field of law. This book is policy-oriented, with non-legal social science featured in the extensive note materials to provide a rich and varied learning experience and a practice resource tool. Notes do more than call attention to difficult questions of legal doctrine and policy; they illuminate them. The authors use a problem approach throughout, in addition to comprehensive case law sources. Problems provide an ideal mechanism for students to acquire the ability to apply legal rules to concrete fact patterns. The Fifth Edition features: More concise treatment of property and alimony; Expanded coverage of same-sex couples, including Lawrence v. Texas and several recent state court decisions; Substantially updated treatment of premarital agreements, featuring both the latest decisions construing the Uniform Premarital Agreement Act, including the California Supreme Court's decision in the Barry Bonds case, and coverage of the alternative approach favored by the American Law Institute.