How to Pick a Guardian for Your Children

By Patricia Louise Nelson of Bend, OR

It is extremely important for parents to select a guardian to nominate to raise their children if the parents die before the children are all at least age 18.  I want to be clear, I am very carefully using the word “nominate.” I am not using the word “appoint.” Under Oregon law, a parent nominates a guardian. A court ultimately appoints a guardian if one is ever needed. The court gives great weight to the parent’s nomination.  But it is not the only factor a court may consider in selecting the guardian.

A court may even decide not to appoint the person nominated by the parent. Sometimes the person the parent nominated is no long able to serve as the guardian due to health or other person issues.  Because that may be the case, I strongly recommend that my client who are the parents of young children state in their will WHY they selected the people they nominated to serve as the guardian for their children.

Those reasons might include that the people live in a certain town (or don’t live in a particular town); that they people practice a specific religion (or don’t); that they have children my client’s children’s ages (or don’t); that they follow a certain personal philosophy (or don’t); that the prospective guardian will cultivate a relationship with blood relatives (or protect the minors from contact with certain blood relatives for good reasons). The potential reasons are limitless – but very important. Tell the court why you chose to nominate the people you chose so that the court can take into consideration those factors in the process of naming the guardian for your children.

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