Rideout v. Riendeau

Until about 1993, Rose and Chesley Rideout were the primary caregivers and custodians of the three children of their daughter, Heaven-Marie. Heaven-Marie married Jeffrey Riendeau in 1992 and later took her children to live with him. After Mrs. Rideout contacted the Department of Human Services regarding Heaven-Marie and Jeffrey''s care of the children, Heaven-Marie terminated all contact between the grandparents and their grandchildren. The grandparents sought court-ordered visitation under Maine's Grandparents Visitation Act, which provides that grandparents may bring a petition for visitation if they demonstrate, inter alia, a "sufficient existing relationship" with their grandchildren. 19-A M.R.S.A. § 1803(1) (1998). The District Court determined that the parents would be entitled to visitation under the Act, but concluded that the Act violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The court reasoned that "[i]f . . .the Act provided a requirement of harm, then it would advance a compelling state interest and pass constitutional muster." The grandparents appealed to the Superior Court, which upheld, and then appealed again.

The Maine Supreme Judicial Court vacates the lower court rulings. The court disagrees with the trial court that a showing of harm is required to give the state a compelling interest to interfere with parents' fundamental liberty interest. At the same time, the court agrees with both the trial court and the U.S. Supreme Court in its recent ruling in Troxel v. Granville, 120 S. Ct. 2054 (2000), that something more than the 'best interest of the child' must be at stake in order to establish a compelling state interest. The court finds a sufficiently compelling interest in the facts presented here: grandparents who had functioned as parents seeking continued contact with the children. 'The cessation of contact with a grandparent whom the child views as a parent,' the court writes, 'may have a dramatic, and even traumatic, effect upon the child''s well-being. The State, therefore, has an urgent, or compelling, interest in providing a forum for those grandparents having such a 'sufficient existing relationship' with their grandchildren. . . We conclude therefore that where the grandparents have acted as the children''s parents for significant periods of time, the Grandparents Visitation Act serves a compelling state interest in addressing the children''s relationship with the people who have cared for them as parents.' The court remands the case to determine the appropriateness of visitation itself.