Taken Into Custody: The War Against Fathers, Marriage, and the Family Hardcover – September 25, 2007

The greatest civil rights abuse in the Western world today is the forced removal of children from their parents, usually their fathers, by family courts and social services agencies. Family courts in America and other democracies have almost absolute power to take away people's children without giving any reason, confiscate their property, and incarcerate them without trial, charge, or counsel. These courts operate largely in secret.

A virtual publishing blackout has protected this abuse, and until now no comprehensive exposé of this political underworld has appeared. Some fine books by authors like Sanford Braver, Warren Farrell, Jeffery Leving, Dean Tong, and Jed Abraham, have partially broken the silence with gently worded critiques of family law and policy, along with numerous self-published books that reach a more limited audience. But this is the first time a major publisher has revealed the full horror of what is taking place in America's family courts and government bureaucracies. Not only the systematic removal of children from fit and loving parents but the criminalization of the parents, often in complete defiance of constitutional protections and due process of law, is widespread and routine.

All assertions are carefully documented by a writer with scholarly credentials (PhD from the London School of Economics and professor of political science at Patrick Henry College). Baskerville not only describes what is happening but explains why, demonstrating the unaccountable power, conflicts-of-interest, and extremist ideology driving the most tyrannical governmental machinery ever to arise in the United States. As such, this book bears comparison with Michael Harrington's The Other America and Upton Sinclair's The Jungle.

Had I not gone through the divorce system, I would have never believed what was written in this book.

It is very scary that in America, with no-fault divorce and no wrong even being alleged, that the government can strip a parent of custody. Criminals have a higher burden of proof and the right to a jury trial; fit, loving parents don't. The precident this sets from a legal standpoint should scare every American who cares about our country.

Most important, he shows that children are suffering at the hands of our judicial system. The "best interest of the child" is nothing more than a subjective slogan to plunder dads who have done nothing wrong and care about their children. I hope every judicial officer in the country reads this book.

In America, the opinion of a custody evaluator is almost never challenged, and if it is, seldom overturned. If you want to hear the bizarre reasons dads are stripped of custody, join a father's right's group. You'll be shocked. Pull the court files and you'll find that what they tell you is true.

We need a presumption of joint physical custody NOW. Divorce will decline, there will be less abuse, children won't be put in the middle.

The mean-spirited advocates who want to label men as all bad will diss this book, no doubt, but this book is spot on.

I have known Stephen Baskerville and his work for years. I am pleased and proud to review this important work by one of the United States leading scholars.

"Destroy the family, and you destroy society." (V. I. Lenin)

No-fault divorce was invented by the Bolsheviks in 1918. The Bolsheviks destroyed the old bourgeois notions of the family and the home, and recreated an allegiance to the government. The United States began a social experiment with no-fault divorce with California's passage of the Family Act of 1969.

The term no-fault divorce is misleading. Rather than no-fault divorce, what we have is unilateral divorce. No-fault divorce is the dissolution of a marriage, upon petition to the court by either party, without the requirement of fault on either party. Either party may request, and receive, the dissolution of the marriage, despite the objections of the other party. Marriage is a contract, and no-fault divorce allows either party to breach the contract without penalty. There is no legal defense against a petition for dissolution of a marriage under no-fault divorce.

The radical swing from 100% fault-based divorce to 100% unilateral non-binding marriage is a failed social experiment. It is today's equivalent of Prohibition. Over 50% of all first marriages end in divorce. The statistics for subsequent marriages are even worse. More than half of all these marriages that end in divorce involve children. Whether these are contested divorces or not, the family court will control the careers, incomes, wealth, debts, and lives of these mothers, fathers, and children until the children are between 18 and 21 years of age.

According to the Americans for Divorce Reform, as the divorce rate soared, so did the number of children involved in divorce. Since in 1972, over one million American children every year have seen their parents divorce. There are over 40 million non-custodial parents and over 50 million children of divorce.

There is much discussion about the protection of marriage, and President Bush proposed a marriage amendment to the Constitution. While this is admirable, it will not protect the institution of marriage until we end our failed social experiment with Bolshevik no-fault divorce. The unintended consequence of prohibition was the rise of organized crime. The (unintended?) consequence of unilateral divorce is the achievement of Lenin's goal, the destruction of the family.

Attorneys, who were elected to their state's legislature, or to the Congress, wrote most of today's divorce laws. When one becomes an attorney, one becomes a member of the Judicial Branch of government. The separation of powers doctrine of the Constitution prohibits a member of the Judicial Branch from also being a member of the Legislative Branch. These attorneys were successful in creating a complex network of laws that guaranteed their involvement in our lives.

In 2004, the Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court declared that marriage was no longer an institution in that state. She pointed out that over two-thirds of all litigation in Michigan was divorce related.

The Democratic Party has been the major proponent of laws and programs that continue the destruction of the family and the demonization of the male. They have gone so far as to promote misandry (hatred of men) in the United States as a form of political correctness. The Republican Party is moving in the direction of the Democratic Party as it courts the female vote. As the Republican Party strives to redefine itself, it moves in the direction of the Democrats and is becoming the "other" big government party. The viability of third parties in the United States is extremely limited, although the Libertarians have succeeded in electing some state and local officials in the Mid-West.

Perhaps the most glaring and blatantly unconstitutional example of misandry is VAWA (Violence Against Women Act), in all of its forms. Democrats Biden, Kennedy, Clinton, and other fellow travelers pushed VAWA through the Congress. Baiden is now pushing for I-VAWA.

Leftists perpetuate the myth of the "Deadbeat Dad" for political gain, although research discredited this myth. Ironically, it is non-custodial Mothers with the worst child support payment record. Research shows that over 75% of the non-payers have no income, are disabled, or are incarcerated. This is despite the fact that academic and government research proved that child support vastly exceeds the cost of raising a child.

Our adversarial legal system feeds upon the conflict that is inherent in divorce. The children pay for the conflict and the lawyers profit from it. We cannot protect our children until we end the Communist's no-fault divorce and take the profit out of divorce.

Dr. Baskerville's books is a must read for all citizens, male and female, married, unmarried, or divorced.

7 years ago I was a happy loving father with 2 daughters a nice house and a good job. Now after 7 years of living hell, I am broke, lost my house, children, real estate, life's savings and 70% of my income. I have been accused of being a threat to myself and others arrested, banned from my house, taken against my will to a psychiatric hospital, and denied access to my children. What have I done, I married a woman who knew how to use the divorce system. Taken into Custody is the first real expose of the greatest injustice in our society. Guilty until proven innocent, insulted, threatened, falsely imprisoned, impoverished I suffered alone and confused. How can this be happening? It can and does happen. The war against fathers is real. Thank you Dr Baskerville, for the truth. We can't let this go on, I don't worry about myself anymore, I worry about my children.