Immigration Article of the Day: The Paradox of Immigrant Children's Rights by Laila L. Hlass
The Paradox of Immigrant Children's Rights by Laila L. Hlass, 104 Tex. L. Rev. Online 142 (2025)
Abstract
Scholars and courts have critiqued how children may receive “the worst of both worlds” in legal systems–where they are deprived of rights while not being accommodated for their developmental needs. The increasingly convoluted treatment of children across legal systems is being seriously reconsidered, with the American Law Institute poised to release a first ever Restatement of the Law in the area of Children and the Law. While the Supreme Court has acknowledged children are persons with constitutional protections, the scope and substance of their rights are murky and, at times, even contradictory. Scholar Catherine Smith argues that jurisprudence has conceptualized rights-bearers as adults, people who are “autonomous, rational, individualistic, and income-generating,” creating cavernous gaps in equal protection and other constitutional rights recognition for children. In short, the law often presumes children are adults such that they are not accommodated; paradoxically, the law also prohibits children from accessing legal systems equally to adults. Building upon recent calls for children’s equality law “that accommodates young people’s qualities, characteristics, and needs,” this Essay explores the paradoxical treatment of children in the web of laws, regulations, guidance, and practice comprising the immigration legal regime. Ultimately, this Essay joins the rallying call to create new children’s equality frameworks to disrupt discriminatory systems and support the expansion of children’s rights.
