Legal Question in Family Law in Montana

Re: seperation

Your daughter apparently wants to apply for the court's permission to become an emancipated minor. Courts rarely grant this because it is not easy for the child to meet the courts' standards for emancipation. If she's just PO'd at her parents (and what child hasn't been?), the court will probably not consider that a valid reason for emancipation.

Briefly (very briefly), she will have to prove:

- that she can support herself

- that she can find and afford housing

- that she has a plan to complete high school

She will very likely have to report to the court frequently to continue proving that she is supporting herself, that she is attending school regularly, and that she is meeting the court's standards for academic standing.

That would be difficult for most average college students - to work, attend school, pay their bills, get good grades.

I suggest that you and your daughter find a mediator who has experience with family tensions. See if you and she can, with the mediator's help, call a truce and work out the difficulties. That can be better in several ways:

- attorneys and court is expensive

- the court might impose a ruling nobody likes

- and the problems between parents and child will still be problems.

- But a mediator can help parents and child identify the problems

- and can help parents and child discover what's causing the problems

- and help parents and child create a kind of peace treaty so they can live together without fighting

- which saves the parents a lot of legal costs

- and lets the kid be a kid for a little longer, complete high school without having to support herself and provide her own home, food, etc.