(Texas Scorecard) – Texas’ Supreme Court is set to determine the limit of Texas Department of Family and Protective Services’ power to dissolve families, while also serving its purpose to protect children.
Multiple legal organizations with an interest in parental rights have weighed in, stressing the significance of a recent state constitutional amendment. Section 37 was added to Article I of the Texas Constitution in November 2025 to expressly protect parental rights.
As the amendment reads:
“To enshrine truths that are deeply rooted in this nation’s history and traditions, the people of Texas hereby affirm that a parent has the responsibility to nurture and protect the parent’s child and the corresponding fundamental right to exercise care, custody, and control of the parent’s child, including the right to make decisions concerning the child’s upbringing.”
The Court now has to decide how Section 37 fits with the existing Texas Family Code termination scheme in Chapter 161—specifically, whether parental rights terminations still use the “clear and convincing evidence” standard or whether Section 37 instead requires strict scrutiny. This is the most demanding level of judicial review in American law.
Background
The case arises from a 2021 Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) investigation into an unnamed family for child endangerment. Texas created the department in 2004 to protect children from harm, with immense power to investigate, sue, and even dissolve families.
According to case filings, DFPS decided not to remove the children, as there was not sufficient evidence of abuse or neglect. A short-term temporary stay with the grandmother was negotiated for the oldest child.
In March 2022, the department investigated allegations against only the mother and only as to the oldest child. It concluded there was no emergency, left the children in the home, and petitioned the court to force the mother to take various classes.
Instead, after a six-month standoff with DFPS, the family moved to Louisiana to escape the department’s jurisdiction.
On August 31, 2022, the State filed a petition seeking the emergency removal of all four children from both parents.
The petition described a dangerous household in which the child was dragged by her hair, beaten, deprived of food, and yelled at—each claim having been refuted.
In April 2024, Judge Phil Vanderpool of the 223rd Judicial District Court in Gray County signed an order terminating both parents’ rights to all of their children.
The Appeal
The mother asserts her parental rights were not terminated for any actual child endangerment, but rather for her refusal to attend counseling or undergo a psychological study. No new evidence of abuse or neglect was presented since DFPS had concluded the household was safe.
Judge Vanderpool’s order was therefore appealed to the 7th Court of Appeals in Amarillo, where a three-judge panel—Justices Brian Quinn, Judy Parker, and Lawrence Doss—affirmed the trial court judgment in September 2024.
The case was then appealed to the Supreme Court of Texas, which heard oral arguments in December 2025. The Court is still considering the case.
The parents argue the trial court never had jurisdiction, as the family was living in Louisiana and such suits are statutorily required to be brought in the county in which the children are found. In light of Section 37’s implementation, they also contend that the natural right existing between parents and their children is of constitutional dimension, meaning termination proceedings are strictly construed in favor of the parent.
First and foremost, the Court must determine the appropriate level of scrutiny to apply.
The State argues that Section 37 merely codified existing protections under Chapter 161, rather than establishing anything new, and that the “clear-and-convincing standard” still applies.
Multiple third parties filed amicus briefs in the case, informing the Court that strict scrutiny is now required by Section 37—if it wasn’t before. Briefs were filed by Family Freedom Project, Texas Public Policy Foundation, Texas Association of Family Defense Attorneys, and attorney Celia Wood.
Amicus Briefs
Family Freedom Project (FFP) wrote that Section 37 “is the first time in the history of our nation that any People have so clearly and holistically enumerated the God-given rights of parents in the highest law of their land. But this boundary means nothing if it is not enforced.”
FFP is asking the court to provide much needed clarity to the state and lower courts as to the limits of its power over families.
“The situation as it stands now cannot continue,” reads the brief. “The casual removal of children; the punitive withholding of visitation; the stacking of irrelevant tasks that the overwhelmed parent must complete to the satisfaction of a subjective bureaucrat—all these and more are far too common occurrences before and during litigation in the trial courts.”
Responding to concerns, FFP argues “[t]he risk highlighted by this case is not that we may someday create a system that does not care about child abuse. The risk is that the system will always tend toward the aggregation of power, and that we forget to hold the line.”
Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) is asking the court to interpret Section 37 in accordance with “the clear wishes” of the people of Texas.
The brief contends that Texans demonstrated their enduring commitment to safeguarding parental rights “by taking the historic step of voting to make Texas the first state in the nation to enshrine parental rights as a fundamental right in its constitution.”
TPPF argues the incorporation of “fundamental rights” language into the text of Section 37 “ensures that courts continue to apply strict scrutiny to any state statute or action that seeks to limit the ability of parents to exercise their right to the care, custody, and control of their children.”
Texas Association of Family Defense Attorneys espoused Texas history to make its point.
The association argued that Section 37 “recognizes the fundamental rights of parents, not as privileges the State may adjust at will, but as liberties presumptively retained by the people; parental rights are not subject to discretionary balancing any more than the cannon at Gonzales was subject to arbitrary seizure.”
“If the parental rights amendment means anything at all, it must mean that heightened scrutiny applies when the state seeks not only to intervene in these fundamental constitutional rights, but extinguish them,” the brief continued.
Wood’s brief argued that strict scrutiny “has historically been the standard applied in termination cases, and the codification of these rights in the constitution is not a reason to provide less protection.”
She added that the government may not “infringe on the fundamental right of parents to make child rearing decisions simply because a state judge believes a ‘better decision’ could be made.”
As the Court weighs its decision, many parental rights advocates are closely following. The ruling will set a precedent for how far DFPS’ power to terminate families extends in light of Section 37.
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