Hamilton v. Lethem, No. SCWC-27580 (Feb. 7, 2012), the opinion we posted about here is being hotly debated and discussed at the Volokh Conspiracy blog here.
Barista’s note (since we represented the petitioner): many of the comments on Volokh make judgments about whether Father’s acts constituted “abuse.” However, the point we made in our arguments to the Hawaii Supreme Court was not that the court should determine whether they were or not, but rather whether it was possible for the lower courts to reach that conclusion without standards to guide the analysis. In the absence of standards, any conclusion they made regarding abuse was an ad hoc decision and violated due process. Thus, the Supreme Court did not reeach a conclusion about whether Father’s acts were permissible discipline, but remanded the case to the family court to apply the standards the court set forth in the opinion, so it could make that determination.