The Complex First Family

• Author: Clare Huntington
• Published date: 01 April 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fcre.12346
• Date: 01 April 2018

THE COMPLEX FIRST FAMILY

Clare Huntington

Rather than comment on a particular policy of the Trump administration, I want to reflect on the

complex family that now inhabits the White House. And by that I mean complex sociologically, not

psychologically—although there is that, too.

A family form becoming more prevalent in the United States stems from multipartner fertility—

having biological children with more than one person.

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Sociologists call these “complex families.”

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Scholars and policy makers typically focus on low-income complex families, expressing concern

about the long-term effects of this family form on children; but one-percenters can have complex

families as well—with President Trump as a case in point.

I am not going to offer a positive spin on the current administration. As the contributions to this

symposium amply demonstrate, President Trump’s policies pose real and significant dangers to

families, particularly those families marginalized by race, class, religion, and immigration status. But

there might be a silver lining to having a complex family occupy the most visible public perch in the

United States. If the president of the United States can have five children with three wives, then this

family form should be more acceptable for everyone. Over time, greater acceptance might lead to

reforms that would better support a broad array of families.

Presidents and their families loom large in the public consciousness, whether they—or we—want

them to. As Stephanie Coontz has long argued, the nuclear family is a modern invention,

3

but this

idealized family form has dominated presidential politics for several decades.

4

For most of the twen-

tieth century, a (seemingly) traditional marriage has been a prerequisite to running for president. And

once in office, we police First Families, as demonstrated by the impeachment of President Clinton

for lying about adultery.

Could a complex family occupying that unique spotlight help legitimize, as it were, this family

form? Arguably not. The personal may be political, but it does not necessarily translate to policy.

Indeed, if anything, President Trump seems to be reinforcing traditional family norms with executive

orders on immigration valorizing the nuclear family

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and the administration’s efforts to limit access

to contraception,

6

to name but two of his many anti-family policies.

Moreover, I am all too aware of the double standard facing women and people of color. As the

first Black president to hold the office, President Obama had to replace the “tangle of pathology”

7

image of Black families and replace it with a Norman Rockwell painting. President and Mrs. Obama

worked hard to preserve this image, and when they strayed even slightly, the criticism was rife.

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Hillary Clinton’s candidacy would have been a nonstarter if she—and not her husband—had the

zipper problem. Thus, President Trump’s family complexity will not necessarily make it easier for a

range of candidates to follow suit.

But setting these caveats aside, there is a possibility that this complex First Family might help

move the nation away from the grip of the 1950s image of family. Indeed, it might remind us that

other First Families—including the first First Family—were far from nuclear, and that notions of

family have always been socially and historically contingent.

President Washington had a very fluid family indeed.

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Likely infertile as a result of smallpox as a

child, President Washington married a widow and adopted her two children. Both children died

young, one in adolescence and the other in early adulthood. George and Martha Washington raised

Correspondence: chuntington@law.fordham.edu

FAMILY COURT REVIEW, Vol. 56 No. 2, April 2018 351–352

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C2018 Association of Family and Conciliation Courts