The Repugnant Assumption

The Repugnant Assumption  

By Dr. Doug Richey  

“Parents can’t be trusted.” This oft stated perspective is troubling, especially when it comes from government entities. During my time in MO’s General Assembly, I encountered this view in conversations about public education, health, and mental health, along with many discussions centered upon the contemporary interest to redefine human sexuality. Many government actors make harmful and unfounded assumptions, like, parents don’t know how to care for their children without instruction from government officials, that kids can make life-altering decisions without parental involvement, or that a parent shouldn’t be notified when public school officials discover important information about that parent’s child. The ever-present premise that accompanies these assumptions is that the ‘government knows best.’ When individuals, operating with the government’s weight and authority, make decisions with this mindset, parents suffer the erosion of a pre-political right – their fundamental right to direct their children’s upbringing, education, and care.  

We must bolster parental rights. Parents’ rights and their corresponding responsibilities existed long before any kind of government existed. This pre-political right is similar in nature to other unalienable rights like conscience, religious liberty, or freedom of speech. Parents don’t need a permission slip from the government to fulfill their God-given duty. In recent years, this understanding began evaporating as America’s secular, anti-religious culture grew. In the assumed absence of God, people turned to government for provision, instruction, as well as ‘rights’ distribution. The result was observable. Intrusive governmental influence multiplied. Parental rights are an important barrier to this presumptive influence. To ignore the importance of bolstering parental rights, and by extension appeasing the effort to weaken this barrier, is to welcome Orwell’s pigs and their agenda.   

What must we do? First, recognize parental rights as fundamental, deserving the strongest level of protection. Parents bring children into this world and oversee their preparation for it. Children are not the product of government. They’re not even the product of the neighbor down the street. They’re a gift from God entrusted to their parents. Thankfully, the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized this foundational truth in cases like Pierce v. Society of Sisters and Troxel v. Granville. Overall, the Court held that parents have a fundamental right to direct the care, education, and upbringing of their children.   

Good news? Yes. What’s the reason for concern?  

Federal law, state statutes, and local ordinances don’t expressly acknowledge the appropriate level of protection this right ought to receive. Often parental rights are treated as a lesser right, undeserving of strict legal protection like other constitutional rights. Therefore, parents are ignored by public schools that ‘socially transition’ students without parental knowledge; parents are threatened with the loss of custody for not ‘affirming’ their child’s desire to be the opposite sex; parents are told they aren’t qualified to teach their own children unless they’re licensed by the state; and parents are cut out of guiding their children’s medical decisions. These threats further highlight the pressing need to pass laws that provide the rights of parents the strongest level of protection like other top-tier, unalienable rights.  

The erosion of parental rights will persist unless we require the strictest scrutiny when a government entity inserts itself into the family. This standard strikes the right balance between strong deference to parental authority while still permitting the state to step in when it has a  

compelling interest—such as protecting a child from physical or sexual abuse. When children suffer at the hands of abusive parents, we welcome intervention. Unfortunately, I’ve witnessed bureaucrats, and their proxies, make the exception into the rule. Because some parents abuse their children, they say, every parent is now suspect. This presumption of nefarious parental intent is used to justify cutting caring parents out of critical decisions regarding their children’s upbringing and education.  

The U.S. Supreme Court correctly responded to this dangerous presumption in its Parham v. J.R. opinion. The Court stated, “The statist notion that governmental power should supersede parental authority in all cases because some parents abuse and neglect children is repugnant to American tradition.” This repugnant notion can’t continue. Government actors must recognize that parental rights are fundamental and actions that burden those rights are subject to strict scrutiny. The government bears the burden of proof when interfering in the family realm and must use the least restrictive means possible to address its concerns. By doing so, we ensure that the overwhelming majority of loving and engaged parents are respected and their constitutional rights safeguarded.  

Second, our laws must protect the full scope of parental rights. In recent years, states have debated narrow slices of parental rights, like a parent’s access to public school curriculum. Though this access is important to secure for parents, these efforts sometimes miss the larger picture. As stated above, the rights of parents extend to the physical health, mental health, and moral upbringing of their children, in addition to their education. Generally, decisions regarding the upbringing, education, and care of children belong to parents. Our laws and regulations must respect parents as the primary decision-makers for their children and broadly safeguard these God-given rights.  

Third, we must provide a clear legal remedy for parents whose rights are violated. Without a corrective mechanism to provide accountability, it remains too easy for government bureaucrats to trample parental rights. Access to the courts plays a crucial role in protecting other rights like speech and religious liberty; it will do the same for parental rights. Parental rights laws that lack the teeth of consequence are merely window dressing.   

These three elements work together to ensure that families will enjoy the full freedom to flourish that God intends. When states like Arizona, Idaho, Montana, and Tennessee codified these three elements in their statutes over the past few years, it signaled to parents that they’re respected. Parents were empowered to freely function for the good of their children and their family, without unwarranted government interference.  

But why are there only four states that demonstrate this level of respect for the fundamental nature of parental rights? As violations of this right continue to populate our social media feeds, the time to act is upon us. From D.C. to your state legislature, the recognition that parental rights are fundamental and entitled to the highest protection available, that those rights extend to a child’s education, healthcare, and more, and that legal remedies exist when violations occur, should all be woven into our laws. As that work unfolds, parents must be strong and courageous, and never grow weary of preserving their fundamental right to raise and educate their kids. The truth is parents can be trusted. And any other assumption is repugnant to our nation’s history and tradition—and to the Constitution itself.  

(Dr. Doug Richey served for twenty-six years as a pastor, for six years in MO’s House of Representatives, and now serves with Alliance Defending Freedom. You may follow him on X, here: @dougrichey)