Georgia Legitimation Reform: Fathers Incorporated at the Columbus Hearing

By Kenneth Braswell, CEO, Fathers Incorporated

This blog post covers the August 13, 2025, Legitimation Study Committee hearing in Columbus, Georgia. To learn about an earlier hearing in Atlanta, check out this recent blog post. 

Georgia’s second Legitimation Study Committee hearing held in Columbus made one thing painfully clear: We don’t just have a legal process problem; we have a family outcomes problem. Muscogee County alone sees roughly half of its births outside marriage, with some neighborhoods approaching four in five. In a state that still requires legitimation, a separate court action for an unmarried father to gain parental rights, that math is destiny for far too many children. And it shouldn’t be that way.

The Committee heard what the day-to-day looks like when policy abstractions like legitimation hit real lives. Committee Vice Chair Teddy Reese cut to the heart of it: “The court system should work for everybody,” he said, not only those who can afford attorneys or navigate a patchwork of county-by-county rules. 

Judge Gil McBride described Columbus’s “Legitimation Station,” a volunteer-powered intake and paperwork clinic backed by a local crime-prevention grant and ARPA-funded senior judge time that helps fathers file uncontested petitions quickly and cheaply. Even with this local innovation, McBride emphasized a principle that shouldn’t be controversial: “There should be some judicial oversight of the process” to protect children’s interests while removing needless barriers for willing parents.

In the hearing, as it does in many conversations about legitimation, signatures on birth certificates continued to surface. Barton Center’s Carrington Buze reminded lawmakers that federal law requires an administrative path to establish paternity because “paternity attaches child support.” Yet, in Georgia, that acknowledgment does not attach decision-making rights. The result, as Reese put it bluntly, is a father’s name on “a document that does absolutely nothing.” That mismatch — obligations without authority — breeds conflict, delays, and, too often, despair.

The Committee also heard how easily the system, including legitimation, turns cooperative parents into adversaries. Researcher and grandmother Meg Murray explained the lived reality for many families. Even after establishing paternity, she said, “You don’t give [dad] parenthood… I call it a bank, not a dad.” That “gauntlet” lowers involvement, not because fathers don’t care, but because the rules and costs make sustained engagement fragile. When a standard parenting plan looks like four days a month and two weeks in summer, children experience a visitor, not a parent.

Testimony from Fathers Incorporated (FI) illuminated both the human texture and the structural fixes within reach. Program director Rodney Kellum shared what he hears from exhausted dads who finally find a safe, competent ear: It’s the “first time someone actually will listen,” they tell him. Michelle Lockhart, FI’s Legitimation Specialist, added, “When we help a dad turn a stack of forms into a court order, we’re not pushing paper. We’re unlocking a relationship.”

CEO Kenneth Braswell offered a lens the law has long ignored: Legitimation wasn’t born from a child-centered vision; it emerged from a property-centered world. “It was about business. It wasn’t about family.” If we start from children’s rights to both parents and from truth (DNA) rather than suspicion, our policy design shifts. Establish parentage early and cleanly, Braswell urged. Separate the factual question of “Who is the parent?” from the evaluative question of “What custody arrangement is best?” Don’t conflate paternity with fitness. The first can be resolved quickly; the second, when needed, deserves careful judicial attention.

Real families don’t live inside neat legal timelines. A Columbus advocate, Arisha Lawrence, described a mental-health crisis where children were at imminent risk during a holiday weekend when the court was closed and the father, despite years of hands-on parenting, had no standing. Her plea was less about ideology than operational urgency: Georgia needs an emergency lane for noncustodial but involved parents to act when a child’s safety is at stake.

The most searing illustration of inconsistency in legitimation came from Steve Brown, a dad whose uncontested petition (mother present, both aligned) was denied twice before a substitute judge finally approved it with minimal friction. “I don’t understand why we’re getting denied. We’re doing everything right,” Brown said. When the same facts yield different outcomes across courtrooms, public trust erodes, and families pay the price.

How to Reform Legitimation in Georgia

What should Georgia do? Chairman Carter Barrett framed the task well: Strive for “real, meaningful progress,” he said, while avoiding “unintended consequences.” And the hearing surfaced a responsible path forward:

• First, for uncontested cases that link acknowledgment and legal rights at (or immediately after) birth, adopt a unified parentage approach that’s still subject to expedited judicial review for the child’s best interest. 
• Second, borrow proven parts of the Uniform Parentage Act to preserve safeguards (e.g., genetic testing admissibility, rescission windows) while streamlining the process for parents who agree. 
• Third, scale what Columbus has built, including funding legitimation navigation statewide, standardizing forms and e-filing, and dedicating senior-judge dockets for self-represented parents so a simple, uncontested case doesn’t languish. 
• Fourth, establish an emergency standing protocol for involved parents in mental health or safety crises. 
• Finally, address the workforce realities unique to Georgia, especially for military families who should never be penalized for deployments that interrupt day-to-day caregiving. As Rep. Lynn Heffner noted, there are “too many active duty military individuals in this state for that demography to be unchecked.”

Fathers Incorporated and Legitimation Reform

FI is positioned to help finish this work. Our practitioners run clinics, coach fathers through county-specific hurdles, and collaborate with courts and community partners, and this connective tissue is precisely what a statewide solution will require. When the General Assembly sets the policy architecture, we can help operationalize it so it works the same in Augusta as it does in Columbus.

We bring data and design, not just passion. Our case management and legal-navigation models are scalable, as is an outreach approach that meets families where they already are — hospitals, schools, child support offices, and military base communities. 

Georgia’s goal should be humane and straightforward. It must ensure that when both parents want to parent, the law says “yes” quickly, safely, and consistently. And when the parents disagree, the law must sort out the “best interest” question without making children strangers to one of the two people they need most. 

The Columbus Legitimation Study Committee hearing showed the problem. It also showed the blueprint. Now it’s time to build.

Kenneth Braswell is a nationally recognized leader in the responsible fatherhood movement, author of several acclaimed books, including When the Tear Won’t Fall, Strength of the Father, Kwesi and the Ogre, and Too Seasoned to Care. He is the CEO of Fathers Incorporated and host of the I Am Dad Podcast.