Cite as: 530 U. S. 57 (2000)
Kennedy, J., dissenting
Child Custody Practice § 8.10 (1986). A case often cited as one of the earliest visitation decisions, Succession of Reiss, 46 La. Ann. 347, 353, 15 So. 151, 152 (1894), explained that "the obligation ordinarily to visit grandparents is moral and not legal"—a conclusion which appears consistent with that of American common-law jurisdictions of the time. Early 20th-century exceptions did occur, often in cases where a relative had acted in a parental capacity, or where one of a child's parents had died. See Douglass v. Merriman, 163 S. C. 210, 161 S. E. 452 (1931) (maternal grandparent awarded visitation with child when custody was awarded to father; mother had died); Solomon v. Solomon, 319 Ill. App. 618, 49 N. E. 2d 807 (1943) (paternal grandparents could be given visitation with child in custody of his mother when their son was stationed abroad; case remanded for fitness hearing); Consaul v. Consaul, 63 N. Y. S. 2d 688 (Sup. Ct. Jefferson Cty. 1946) (paternal grandparents awarded visitation with child in custody of his mother; father had become incompetent). As a general matter, however, contemporary state-court decisions acknowledge that "[h]istorically, grandparents had no legal right of visitation," Campbell v. Campbell, 896 P. 2d 635, 642, n. 15 (Utah App. 1995), and it is safe to assume other third parties would have fared no better in court.
To say that third parties have had no historical right to petition for visitation does not necessarily imply, as the Supreme Court of Washington concluded, that a parent has a constitutional right to prevent visitation in all cases not involving harm. True, this Court has acknowledged that States have the authority to intervene to prevent harm to children, see, e. g., Prince, supra, at 168-169; Yoder, supra, at 233-234, but that is not the same as saying that a heightened harm to the child standard must be satisfied in every case in which a third party seeks a visitation order. It is also true that the law's traditional presumption has been "that natural bonds of affection lead parents to act in the
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