Document Type
Article
Publication Date
5-2023
Abstract
The case of Britney Spears has shined a spotlight on guardianship, a subject area in which there has been increasing interest in recent years. The events surrounding Ms. Spears s case all occurred in a single jurisdiction, California. But with Americas increasingly mobile population, an individual for whom a guardianship is sought may have contacts with multiple states and, in some cases, foreign countries. Furthermore, following the appointment of a guardian, the guardian or individual subject to guardianship may move to another jurisdiction; it may become necessary to transfer the guardianship proceeding to another jurisdiction or seek ratification of a local guardians acts in another place.
The common law was ill-equipped to address the challenges of modem guardianship, where the participants in the proceeding often have contacts with more than one state. The application of well-established but sometimes uncertain concepts of domicile, residence, and presence could result in multiple states having concurrent jurisdiction to appoint a guardian or otherwise deal with an individuals property. Also, it was sometimes stated that a guardians authority stops at the state line, thereby denying the guardians actions extra-territorial effect.
This Article begins with a discussion of representative cases that illustrate the jurisdictional conflicts that can arise in adult guardianship. The Article then discusses how the common law, state statutes, the Restatement of Conflict of laws, and prior uniform acts failed to adequately respond to these challenges. The Article then turns to a detailed analysis of the UA GPP JA and to case law decided under that Act. The Article concludes with a recommendation on how adult guardianship should be addressed in the Restatement (Third) of Conflict of Laws project and makes a plea for more complete guardianship data so that the effectiveness of the UAGPPJA and other legislative solutions in guardianship can be better assessed.
Recommended Citation
David M. English,
Jurisdictional Conflicts in Adult Guardianship, 97 Tulane Law Review 743
(2023).
Available at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/facpubs/1219
