Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Connecticut Law Review
Publication Date
1994
Abstract
In consequence, as noted, a significant confusion introduced into contemporary law by the effort of the courts to respond to the challenges posed by reproductive technology has been compounded significantly by the introduction of a concept designed to resolve the initial confusion. This paper focuses on both confusions. It considers first a dilemma that, over the past two decades, has faced courts in many cases involving reproductive technology: whether to think about the family primarily through traditional metaphors of love and home, or through the metaphors of the market. In large part, courts do not seem aware of this dilemma; yet, it permeates judicial response, and in large measure accounts for judicial confusion. The paper then considers the effort by the courts to diminish the confusion by resorting to "intent" as the mediating principle between the demands of home and market. Finally, the paper discusses the limitations of "intent" as mediator in the contemporary legal meditation upon reproductive technology. The paper performs each of its tasks by detailed analysis of cases involving frozen embryos, gestational surrogacy, and the use of a decedent's sperm.
Recommended Citation
Janet L. Dolgin,
The "Intent" of Reproduction: Reproductive Technologies and the Parent-Child Bond, 26 Conn. L. Rev. 1261
(1994)
Available at: https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra.edu/faculty_scholarship/66