ARGUMENT I.

A DEFENDANT IN A TORT ACTION BOUGHT BY A CHILD SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO ASSERT THE DEFENSE OF CONTRIBUTORY NEGLIGENCE BY THE PARENTS WHEN THE PARENTS NEGLIGENCE IN SUPERVISING AND CARING FOR THE CHILD CAUSED OR CONTRIBUTED TO THE INJURY. The courts decision was controlled by the doctrine of parental immunity as set forth in Lanir v Lanir. This doctrine protects parents in lawsuits brought by their children. Absolute parental immunity, however, would leave parents unaccountable when their negligence caused or contributed to the childs injury. Other states have provided exceptions to absolute parental immunity and thereby furnish protection to children whose injuries are at least partially due to parental contributory negligence. A. The court should adopt an exception to the parental immunity doctrine that parents are immune only when they are negligent in providing to their child the supervision and care which they are legally obligated to provide. Exceptions to the parental immunity doctrine should be allowed only when the parents negligence did not contribute to the childs injury. The law in this state sets aside the rule that makes parents immune in personal injury actions for negligence except for two areas, (1) the exercise of parental authority or discipline over the child, and (2) the provision of food, clothing, housing, medical care, and other care. The court ruled that other care can include the providing for the child's education (Geller v. Geller). Under this states law, parents are legally obligated to provide for their child the supervision and care as required under this law. That should apply to this case because Susan Lee was using the chemistry set for educational purposes. As Thomas Lee stated in his deposition, he purchased the chemistry set because, she [Susan] was very good at science (page 51). Susan Lees use of the chemistry set should be considered to be for educational purposes because the chemistry set was provided to Susan Lee to advance her knowledge in science. The first thing a child should learn when entering a chemistry lab is lab safety. Educating their daughter about safety when using the chemistry set should be considered as providing parental other care'' as contemplated by Geller. This court should allow an exception to parental immunity as found in Geller because Susan Lee's parents had the legal obligation to educate her about how to safely use the Chem VII chemistry set. The trial court based its ruling on parental immunity as defined in Lanir v. Lanir. The exception to parental immunity allowed in Geller should apply to Lanir v. Lanir as well. "Other care" being extended to include the childs education is ejusdem generis as the father in Lanir was responsible to educate his child on gun safety. Because the trial courts decision in this case is based on the ruling in Lanir, that decision should be reversed if part of the childs education includes in safely using a chemistry as much as the childs education in Lanir included the child's safe use of a gun. The court should allow an exception to the parental immunity doctrine because of legal the obligation of parents to educate their children. B. Alternatively, this court should replace total parental immunity with the reasonable parent rule. The court should replace parental immunity with the reasonable parent rule because parental immunity is too broad to be effective in affording protection to children. This state replaced the

parental immunity doctrine with the reasonable parent rule which states that parents are liable only if they do or fail to do what an ordinary and reasonably prudent parent would do in similar circumstances. (Peterson v. Peterson). The rule in Peterson, supra, should apply to this case because the reasonable parent rule protects children from negligent parents. In Peterson the court reversed the decision of the trial court based on the parental immunity doctrine, which was held to be overly broad in that it protected parents from any kind of lawsuit, including one in which their negligence caused or contributed to the childs injury. (Peterson, supra). In Peterson, the father did not use proper judgment when he asked his child to go on a busy highway to check a flat tire. Similarly, the parents of Susan Lee should not have let her play with such an advanced chemistry set unsupervised and without any safety instruction. A reasonable parent would have known the dangers in letting a five year old play unsupervised with a chemistry set which is intended for 16 to 18 year olds. Because both this case and Peterson deal with minors participating in adult activities without parental supervision, this court should adopt the reasonable parent standard in order to protect children from negligent parenting. The parental immunity clause was adopted to protect parental authority and discipline (Peterson, supra). However, the rationale that parental immunity should prevents any kind of lawsuit against negligent parents is detrimental to the family unit. The child still needs protection from parents who neglect them and harm their socialization into society. The parental immunity clause goes too far and is one-sided. The reasonable parent rule, however, protects the family as a unit by affording reasonable protection to children and encourages parents to act responsibly. The court should replace total parental immunity with reasonable parent rule to keep parents accountable to their legal obligations.

II. THE COURT SHOULD ABOLISH PARENTAL IMMUNITY ALTOGETHER. The court should abolish parental immunity on the grounds that it inhibits parental accountability. The parental immunity clause was put into practice to protect parental authority and discipline (Peterson v. Peterson). However, the law extends to protect parents from any type of law suit, placing a blanket of immunity over the parents to the potential detriment of the children in the family. This applies in this case because if parental immunity was abolished entirely, all parents, the Lees included, would have the legal obligation to protect, nurture, and educate their children. The child should have protection from negligent parents. The abolishment of parental immunity would result in no such protection for neglected children. The defendant could argue that since the family is a single economic unit, the courts adopting the reasonable parent standard would put a strain on the family and put a strain on the third party tortfeasor (Wilkes v. Torkko). However, this ignores the child in the family and does not allow the law to protect the child. This leaves the child open to a neglected life and warped socialization, which could ultimately be detrimental to society. This court should reverse the decision of the trial court and abolish the doctrine of parental immunity because the effects of parental neglect could have on children.