Justice Stevens

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The question presented is whether New York has sufficiently protected an unmarried father’s inchoate relationship with a child whom he has never supported and rarely seen in *250the two years since her birth. The appellant, Jonathan Lehr, claims that the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment, as interpreted in Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972), and Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 (1979), give him an absolute right to notice and an opportunity to be heard before the child may be adopted. We disagree.

Jessica M. was born out of wedlock on November 9, 1976. Her mother, Lorraine Robertson, married Richard Robertson eight months after Jessica’s birth.1 On December 21, 1978, when Jessica was over two years old, the Robertsons filed an adoption petition in the Family Court of Ulster County, New York. The court heard their testimony and received a favorable report from the Ulster County Department of Social Services. On March 7, 1979, the court entered an order of adoption.2 In this proceeding, appellant contends that the adoption order is invalid because he, Jessica’s putative father, was not given advance notice of the adoption proceeding.3

The State of New York maintains a “putative father registry.”4 A man who files with that registry demonstrates his *251intent to claim paternity of a child born out of wedlock and is therefore entitled to receive notice of any proceeding to adopt that child. Before entering Jessica’s adoption order, the Ulster County Family Court had the putative father registry examined. Although appellant claims to be Jessica’s natural father, he had not entered his name in the registry.

In addition to the persons whose names are listed on the putative father registry, New York law requires that notice of an adoption proceeding be given to several other classes of possible fathers of children born out of wedlock — those who have been adjudicated to be the father, those who have been identified as the father on the child’s birth certificate, those who live openly with the child and the child’s mother and who hold themselves out to be the father, those who have been identified as the father by the mother in a sworn written statement, and those who were married to the child’s mother before the child was six months old.5 Appellant admittedly *252was not a member of any of those classes. He had lived with appellee prior to Jessica’s birth and visited her in the hospital when Jessica was born, but his name does not appear on Jessica’s birth certificate. He did not live with appellee or Jessica after Jessica’s birth, he has never provided them with any financial support, and he has never offered to marry appellee. Nevertheless, he contends that the following special circumstances gave him a constitutional right to notice and a hearing before Jessica was adopted.

On January 30, 1979, one month after the adoption proceeding was commenced in Ulster County, appellant filed a “visitation and paternity petition” in the Westchester County Family Court. In that petition, he asked for a determination of paternity, an order of support, and reasonable visitation privileges with Jessica. Notice of that proceeding was served on appellee on February 22, 1979. Four days later appellee’s attorney informed the Ulster County Court that appellant had commenced a paternity proceeding in West-chester County; the Ulster County judge then entered an *253order staying appellant’s paternity proceeding until he could rule on a motion to change the venue of that proceeding to Ulster County. On March 3, 1979, appellant received notice of the change of venue motion and, for the first time, learned that an adoption proceeding was pending in Ulster County.

On March 7, 1979, appellant’s attorney telephoned the Ulster County judge to inform him that he planned to seek a stay of the adoption proceeding pending the determination of the paternity petition. In that telephone conversation, the judge advised the lawyer that he had already signed the adoption order earlier that day. According to appellant’s attorney, the judge stated that he was aware of the pending paternity petition but did not believe he was required to give notice to appellant prior to the entry of the order of adoption.

Thereafter, the Family Court in Westchester County granted appellee’s motion to dismiss the paternity petition, holding that the putative father’s right to seek paternity “must be deemed severed so long as an order of adoption exists.” App. 228. Appellant did not appeal from that dismissal.6 On June 22,1979, appellant filed a petition to vacate the order of adoption on the ground that it was obtained by fraud and in violation of his constitutional rights. The Ulster County Family Court received written and oral argument on the question whether it had “dropped the ball” by approving the adoption without giving appellant advance notice. Tr. 53. After deliberating for several months, it denied the petition, explaining its decision in a thorough written opinion. In re Adoption of Martz, 102 Misc. 2d 102, 423 N. Y. S. 2d 378 (1979).

The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court affirmed. In re Adoption of Jessica “XX,” 77 App. Div. 2d 381, 434 N. Y. S. 2d 772 (1980). The majority held that appellant’s commencement of a paternity action did not give him any *254right to receive notice of the adoption proceeding, that the notice provisions of the statute were constitutional, and that Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 (1979), was not retroactive.7 Parenthetically, the majority observed that appellant “could have insured his right to notice by signing the putative father registry.” 77 App. Div. 2d, at 383, 434 N. Y. S. 2d, at 774. One justice dissented on the ground that the filing of the paternity proceeding should have been viewed as the statutory equivalent of filing a notice of intent to claim paternity with the putative father registry.

The New York Court of Appeals also affirmed by a divided vote. In re Adoption of Jessica “XX,” 54 N. Y. 2d 417, 430 N. E. 2d 896 (1981). The majority first held that it did not need to consider whether our decision in Caban affected appellant’s claim that he had a right to notice, because Caban was not retroactive.8 It then rejected the argument that the mother had been guilty of a fraud upon the court. Finally, it addressed what it described as the only contention of substance advanced by appellant: that it was an abuse of discretion to enter the adoption order without requiring that notice be given to appellant. The court observed that the primary purpose of the notice provision of § 111-a was to enable the person served to provide the court with evidence concerning the best interest of the child, and that appellant had made no tender indicating any ability to provide any particular or special information relevant to Jessica’s best interest. Considering the record as a whole, and acknowledging that it might have been prudent to give notice, the court concluded *255that the Family Court had not abused its discretion either when it entered the order without notice or when it denied appellant’s petition to reopen the proceedings. The dissenting judges concluded that the Family Court had abused its discretion, both when it entered the order without notice and when it refused to reopen the proceedings.

Appellant has now invoked our appellate jurisdiction.9 He offers two alternative grounds for holding the New York statutory scheme unconstitutional. First, he contends that a putative father’s actual or potential relationship with a child born out of wedlock is an interest in liberty which may not be destroyed without due process of law; he argues therefore that he had a constitutional right to prior notice and an opportunity to be heard before he was deprived of that interest. Second, he contends that the gender-based classification in the statute, which both denied him the right to consent to Jessica’s adoption and accorded him fewer procedural rights than her mother, violated the Equal Protection Clause.10

*256 The Due Process Claim.

The Fourteenth Amendment provides that no State shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. When that Clause is invoked in a novel context, it is our practice to begin the inquiry with a determination of the precise nature of the private interest that is threatened by the State. See, e. g., Cafeteria Workers v. McElroy, 367 U. S. 886, 895-896 (1961). Only after that interest has been identified, can we properly evaluate the adequacy of the State’s process. See Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U. S. 471, 482-483 (1972). We therefore first consider the nature of the interest in liberty for which appellant claims constitutional protection and then turn to a discussion of the adequacy of the procedure that New York has provided for its protection.

I

The intangible fibers that connect parent and child have infinite variety. They are woven throughout the fabric of our society, providing it with strength, beauty, and flexibility. It is self-evident that they are sufficiently vital to merit constitutional protection in appropriate cases. In deciding whether this is such a case, however, we must consider the broad framework that has traditionally been used to resolve the legal problems arising from the parent-child relationship.

In the vast majority of cases, state law determines the final outcome. Cf. United States v. Yazell, 382 U. S. 341, 351— 353 (1966). Rules governing the inheritance of property, adoption, and child custody are generally specified in statutory enactments that vary from State to State.11 Moreover, equally varied state laws governing marriage and divorce affect a multitude of parent-child relationships. The institu*257tion of marriage has played a critical role both in defining the legal entitlements of family members and in developing the decentralized structure of our democratic society.12 In recognition of that role, and as part of their general overarching concern for serving the best interests of children, state laws almost universally express an appropriate preference for the formal family.13

In some cases, however, this Court has held that the Federal Constitution supersedes state law and provides even greater protection for certain formal family relationships. In those cases, as in the state cases, the Court has emphasized the paramount interest in the welfare of children and has noted that the rights of the parents are a counterpart of the responsibilities they have assumed. Thus, the “liberty” of parents to control the education of their children that was vindicated in Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390 (1923), and Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510 (1925), was described as a “right, coupled with the high duty, to recognize and prepare [the child] for additional obligations.” Id., at 535. The linkage between parental duty and parental right was stressed again in Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U. S. 158, 166 (1944), when the Court declared it a cardinal principle “that the custody, care and nurture of the child reside *258first in the parents, whose primary function and freedom include preparation for obligations the state can neither supply nor hinder.” Ibid. In these cases the Court has found that the relationship of love and duty in a recognized family unit is an interest in liberty entitled to constitutional protection. See also Moore v. City of East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494 (1977) (plurality opinion). “[S]tate intervention to terminate [such a] relationship . . . must be accomplished by procedures meeting the requisites of the Due Process Clause.” Santosky v. Kramer, 455 U. S. 745, 753 (1982).

There are also a few cases in which this Court has considered the extent to which the Constitution affords protection to the relationship between natural parents and children born out of wedlock. In some we have been concerned with the rights of the children, see, e. g., Trimble v. Gordon, 430 U. S. 762 (1977); Jimenez v. Weinberger, 417 U. S. 628 (1974); Weber v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 406 U. S. 164 (1972). In this case, however, it is a parent who claims that the State has improperly deprived him of a protected interest in liberty. This Court has examined the extent to which a natural father’s biological relationship with his child receives protection under the Due Process Clause in precisely three cases: Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972), Quilloin v. Walcott, 434 U. S. 246 (1978), and Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 (1979).

Stanley involved the constitutionality of an Illinois statute that conclusively presumed every father of a child born out of wedlock to be an unfit person to have custody of his children. The father in that case had lived with his children all their lives and had lived with their mother for 18 years. There was nothing in the record to indicate that Stanley had been a neglectful father who had not cared for his children. 405 U. S., at 655. Under the statute, however, the nature of the actual relationship between parent and child was completely irrelevant. Once the mother died, the children were automatically made wards of the State. Relying in part on a *259Michigan case14 recognizing that the preservation of “a subsisting relationship with the child’s father” may better serve the child’s best interest than “uprooting him from the family which he knew from birth,” id., at 654-655, n. 7, the Court held that the Due Process Clause was violated by the automatic destruction of the custodial relationship without giving the father any opportunity to present evidence regarding his fitness as a parent.15

Quilloin involved the constitutionality of a Georgia statute that authorized the adoption, over the objection of the natural father, of a child born out of wedlock. The father in that case had never legitimated the child. It was only after the mother had remarried and her new husband had filed an adoption petition that the natural father sought visitation rights and filed a petition for legitimation. The trial court found adoption by the new husband to be in the child’s best interests, and we unanimously held that action to be consistent with the Due Process Clause.

Caban involved the conflicting claims of two natural parents who had maintained joint custody of their children from the time of their birth until they were respectively two and four years old. The father challenged the validity of an order authorizing the mother’s new husband to adopt the children; he relied on both the Equal Protection Clause and the Due Process Clause. Because this Court upheld his equal protection claim, the majority did not address his due process challenge. The comments on the latter claim by the four dissenting Justices are nevertheless instructive, because they identify the clear distinction between a mere biolog*260ical relationship and an actual relationship of parental responsibility.

Justice Stewart correctly observed:

“Even if it be assumed that each married parent after divorce has some substantive due process right to maintain his or her parental relationship, cf. Smith v. Organization of Foster Families, 431 U. S. 816, 862-863 (opinion concurring in judgment), it by no means follows that each unwed parent has any such right. Parental rights do not spring full-blown from the biological connection between parent and child. They require relationships more enduring.” 441 U. S., at 397 (emphasis added).16

In a similar vein, the other three dissenters in Caban were prepared to “assume that, if and when one develops, the relationship between a father and his natural child is entitled to protection against arbitrary state action as a matter of due process.” Caban v. Mohammed, supra, at 414 (emphasis added).

*261The difference between the developed parent-child relationship that was implicated in Stanley and Caban, and the potential relationship involved in Quilloin and this case, is both clear and significant. When an unwed father demonstrates a full commitment to the responsibilities of parenthood by “com[ing] forward to participate in the rearing of his child,” Caban, 441 U. S., at 392, his interest in personal contact with his child acquires substantial protection under the Due Process Clause. At that point it may be said that he “act[s] as a father toward his children.” Id., at 389, n. 7. But the mere existence of a biological link does not merit equivalent constitutional protection. The actions of judges neither create nor sever genetic bonds. “[T]he importance of the familial relationship, to the individuals involved and to the society, stems from the emotional attachments that derive from the intimacy of daily association, and from the role it plays in ‘promoting] a way of life’ through the instruction of children ... as well as from the fact of blood relationship.” Smith v. Organization of Foster Families for Equality and Reform, 431 U. S. 816, 844 (1977) (quoting Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U. S. 205, 231-233 (1972)).17

*262The significance of the biological connection is that it offers the natural father an opportunity that no other male possesses to develop a relationship with his offspring. If he grasps that opportunity and accepts some measure of responsibility for the child’s future, he may enjoy the blessings of the parent-child relationship and make uniquely valuable contributions to the child’s development.18 If he fails to do so, the Federal Constitution will not automatically compel a State to listen to his opinion of where the child’s best interests lie.

In this case, we are not assessing the constitutional adequacy of New York’s procedures for terminating a developed relationship. Appellant has never had any significant custodial, personal, or financial relationship with Jessica, and he did not seek to establish a legal tie until after she was two years old.19 We are concerned only with whether New York *263has adequately protected his opportunity to form such a relationship.

II

The most effective protection of the putative father’s opportunity to develop a relationship with his child is provided by the laws that authorize formal marriage and govern its consequences. But the availability of that protection is, of course, dependent on the will of both parents of the child. Thus, New York has adopted a special statutory scheme to protect the unmarried father’s interest in assuming a responsible role in the future of his child.

After this Court’s decision in Stanley, the New York Legislature appointed a special commission to recommend legislation that would accommodate both the interests of biological fathers in their children and the children’s interest in prompt and certain adoption procedures. The commission recommended, and the legislature enacted, a statutory adoption scheme that automatically provides notice to seven categories of putative fathers who are likely to have assumed some responsibility for the care of their natural children.20 If *264this scheme were likely to omit many responsible fathers, and if qualification for notice were beyond the control of an interested putative father, it might be thought procedurally inadequate. Yet, as all of the New York courts that reviewed this matter observed, the right to receive notice was completely within appellant’s control. By mailing a postcard to the putative father registry, he could have guaranteed that he would receive notice of any proceedings to adopt Jessica. The possibility that he may have .failed to do so because of his ignorance of the law cannot be a sufficient reason for criticizing the law itself. The New York Legislature concluded that a more open-ended notice requirement would merely complicate the adoption process, threaten the privacy interests of unwed mothers,21 create the risk of unnecessary controversy, and impair the desired finality of adoption decrees. Regardless of whether we would have done likewise if we were legislators instead of judges, we surely cannot characterize the State’s conclusion as arbitrary.22

Appellant argues, however, that even if the putative father’s opportunity to establish a relationship with an illegitimate child is adequately protected by the New York statutory scheme in the normal case, he was nevertheless entitled *265to special notice because the court and the mother knew that he had filed an affiliation proceeding in another court. This argument amounts to nothing more than an indirect attack on the notice provisions of the New York statute. The legitimate state interests in facilitating the adoption of young children and having the adoption proceeding completed expeditiously that underlie the entire statutory scheme also justify a trial judge’s determination to require all interested parties to adhere precisely to the procedural requirements of the statute. The Constitution does not require either a trial judge or a litigant to give special notice to nonparties who are presumptively capable of asserting and protecting their own rights.23 Since the New York statutes adequately protected appellant’s inchoate interest in establishing a relationship with Jessica, we find no merit in the claim that his constitutional rights were offended because the Family Court strictly complied with the notice provisions of the statute.

The Equal Protection Claim.

The concept of equal justice under law requires the State to govern impartially. New York City Transit Authority v. Beazer, 440 U. S. 568, 587 (1979). The sovereign may not draw distinctions between individuals based solely on differences that are irrelevant to a legitimate governmental objective. Reed v. Reed, 404 U. S. 71, 76 (1971).24 Specifically, *266it may not subject men and women to disparate treatment when there is no substantial relation between the disparity and an important state purpose. Ibid.; Craig v. Boren, 429 U. S. 190, 197-199 (1976).

The legislation at issue in this case, N. Y. Dom. Rel. Law §§ 111 and 111-a (McKinney 1977 and Supp. 1982-1983), is intended to establish procedures for adoptions. Those procedures are designed to promote the best interests of the child, to protect the rights of interested third parties, and to ensure promptness and finality.25 To serve those ends, the legislation guarantees to certain people the right to veto an adoption and the right to prior notice of any adoption proceeding. The mother of an illegitimate child is always within that favored class, but only certain putative fathers are included. Appellant contends that the gender-based distinction is invidious.

As we have already explained, the existence or nonexistence of a substantial relationship between parent and child is a relevant criterion in evaluating both the rights of the *267parent and the best interests of the child. In Quilloin v. Walcott, we noted that the putative father, like appellant, “ha[d] never shouldered any significant responsibility with respect to the daily supervision, education, protection, or care of the child. Appellant does not complain of his exemption from these responsibilities . . . .” 434 U. S., at 256. We therefore found that a Georgia statute that always required a mother’s consent to the adoption of a child born out of wedlock, but required the father’s consent only if he had legitimated the child, did not violate the Equal Protection Clause. Because appellant, like the father in Quilloin, has never established a substantial relationship with his daughter, see supra, at 262, the New York statutes at issue in this case did not operate to deny appellant equal protection.

We have held that these statutes may not constitutionally be applied in that class of cases where the mother and father are in fact similarly situated with regard to their relationship with the child. In Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 (1979), the Court held that it violated the Equal Protection Clause to grant the mother a veto over the adoption of a 4-year-old girl and a 6-year-old boy, but not to grant a veto to their father, who had admitted paternity and had participated in the rearing of the children. The Court made it clear, however, that if the father had not “come forward to participate in the rearing of his child, nothing in the Equal Protection Clause [would] preclud[e] the State from withholding from him the privilege of vetoing the adoption of that child.” Id., at 392.

Jessica’s parents are not like the parents involved in Caban. Whereas appellee had a continuous custodial responsibility for Jessica, appellant never established any custodial, personal, or financial relationship with her. If one parent has an established custodial relationship with the child and the other parent has either abandoned26 or never estab-*268fished a relationship, the Equal Protection Clause does not prevent a State from according the two parents different legal rights.27

The judgment of the New York Court of Appeals is

Affirmed.

Justice White,

with whom Justice Marshall and Justice Blackmun join, dissenting.

The question in this case is whether the State may, consistent with the Due Process Clause, deny notice and an opportunity to be heard in an adoption proceeding to a putative father when the State has actual notice of his existence, whereabouts, and interest in the child.

It is axiomatic that “[t]he fundamental requirement of due process is the opportunity to be heard ‘at a meaningful time and in a meaningful manner.’” Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U. S. 319, 333 (1976), quoting Armstrong v. Manzo, 380 U. S. 545, 552 (1965). As Jessica’s biological father, Lehr either had an interest protected by the Constitution or he did not.1 If the entry of the adoption order in this case deprived Lehr of a constitutionally protected interest, he is entitled to notice and an opportunity to be heard before the order can be accorded finality.

According to Lehr, he and Jessica’s mother met in 1971 and began living together in 1974. The couple cohabited for *269approximately two years, until Jessica’s birth in 1976. Throughout the pregnancy and after the birth, Lorraine acknowledged to friends and relatives that Lehr was Jessica’s father; Lorraine told Lehr that she had reported to the New York State Department of Social Services that he was the father.2 Lehr visited Lorraine and Jessica in the hospital every day during Lorraine’s confinement. According to Lehr, from the time Lorraine was discharged from the hospital until August 1978, she concealed her whereabouts from him. During this time Lehr never ceased his efforts to locate Lorraine and Jessica and achieved sporadic success until August 1977, after which time he was unable to locate them at all. On those occasions when he did determine Lorraine’s location, he visited with her and her children to the extent she was willing to permit it. When Lehr, with the aid of a detective agency, located Lorraine and Jessica in August 1978, Lorraine was already married to Mr. Robertson. Lehr asserts that at this time he offered to provide financial assistance and to set up a trust fund for Jessica, but that Lorraine refused. Lorraine threatened Lehr with arrest unless he stayed away and refused to permit him to see Jessica. Thereafter Lehr retained counsel who wrote to Lorraine in early December 1978, requesting that she permit Lehr to visit Jessica and threatening legal action on Lehr’s behalf. On December 21, 1978, perhaps as a response to Lehr’s threatened legal action, appellees commenced the adoption action at issue here.

The majority posits that “[t]he intangible fibers that connect parent and child . . . are sufficiently vital to merit constitutional protection in appropriate cases.” Ante, at 256 *270(emphasis added). It then purports to analyze the particular facts of this case to determine whether appellant has a constitutionally protected liberty interest. We have expressly rejected that approach. In Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U. S. 564, 570-571 (1972), we stated that although “a weighing process has long been a part of any determination of the form of hearing required in particular situations ... to determine whether due process requirements apply in the first place, we must look not to the ‘weight’ but to the nature of the interest at stake ... to see if the interest is within the Fourteenth Amendment’s protection . . . .” See, e. g., Smith v. Organization of Foster Families, 431 U. S. 816, 839-842 (1977); Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U. S. 651, 672 (1977); Meachum v. Fano, 427 U. S. 215, 224 (1976); Goss v. Lopez, 419 U. S. 565, 575-576 (1975); Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U. S. 471, 481 (1972).

The “nature of the interest” at stake here is the interest that a natural parent has in his or her child, one that has long been recognized and accorded constitutional protection. We have frequently “stressed the importance of familial bonds, whether or not legitimized by marriage, and accorded them constitutional protection.” Little v. Streater, 452 U. S. 1, 13 (1981). If “both the child and the [putative father] in a paternity action have a compelling interest” in the accurate outcome of such a case, ibid., it cannot be disputed that both the child and the putative father have a compelling interest in the outcome of a proceeding that may result in the termination of the father-child relationship. “A parent’s interest in the accuracy and justice of the decision to terminate his or her parental status is... a commanding one.” Lassiter v. Department of Social Services, 452 U. S. 18, 27 (1981). It is beyond dispute that a formal order of adoption, no less than a formal termination proceeding, operates to permanently terminate parental rights.

Lehr’s version of the “facts” paints a far different picture than that portrayed by the majority. The majority’s recita*271tion, that “[ajppellant has never had any significant custodial, personal, or financial relationship with Jessica, and he did not seek to establish a legal tie until after she was two years old,” ante, at 262, obviously does not tell the whole story. Appellant has never been afforded an opportunity to present his case. The legitimation proceeding he instituted was first stayed, and then dismissed, on appellees’ motions. Nor could appellant establish his interest during the adoption proceedings, for it is the failure to provide Lehr notice and an opportunity to be heard there that is at issue here. We cannot fairly make a judgment based on the quality or substance of a relationship without a complete and developed factual record. This case requires us to assume that Lehr’s allegations are true — that but for the actions of the child’s mother there would have been the kind of significant relationship that the majority concedes is entitled to the full panoply of procedural due process protections.3

I reject the peculiar notion that the only significance of the biological connection between father and child is that “it offers the natural father an opportunity that no other male possesses to develop a relationship with his offspring.” Ante, at 262. A “mere biological relationship” is not as unimportant in determining the nature of liberty interests as the majority suggests.

*272“[T]he usual understanding of 'family’ implies biological relationships, and most decisions treating the relation between parent and child have stressed this element.” Smith v. Organization of Foster Families, supra, at 843. The “biological connection” is itself a relationship that creates a protected interest. Thus the “nature” of the interest is the parent-child relationship; how well developed that relationship has become goes to its “weight,” not its “nature.”4 Whether Lehr’s interest is entitled to constitutional protection does not entail a searching inquiry into the quality of the relationship but a simple determination of the fact that the relationship exists — a fact that even the majority agrees must be assumed to be established.

Beyond that, however, because there is no established factual basis on which to proceed, it is quite untenable to conclude that a putative father’s interest in his child is lacking in substance, that the father in effect has abandoned the child, or ultimately that the father’s interest is not entitled to the same minimum procedural protections as the interests of other putative fathers. Any analysis of the adequacy of the notice in this case must be conducted on the assumption that the interest involved here is as strong as that of any putative father. That is not to say that due process requires actual notice to every putative father or that adoptive parents or the State must conduct an exhaustive search of records or an intensive investigation before a final adoption order may be entered. The procedures adopted by the State, however, must at least represent a reasonable effort to determine the *273identity of the putative father and to give him adequate notice.

II

In this case, of course, there was no question about either the identity or the location of the putative father. The mother knew exactly who he was and both she and the court entering the order of adoption knew precisely where he was and how to give him actual notice that his parental rights were about to be terminated by an adoption order.5 Lehr was entitled to due process, and the right to be heard is one of the fundamentals of that right, which “ ‘has little reality or worth unless one is informed that the matter is pending and can choose for himself whether to appear or default, acquiesce or contest.’” Schroeder v. City of New York, 371 U. S. 208, 212 (1962), quoting Mullane v. Central Hanover Trust Co., 339 U. S. 306, 314 (1950).

The State concedes this much but insists that Lehr has had all the process that is due to him. It relies on § 111-a, which designates seven categories of unwed fathers to whom notice of adoption proceedings must be given, including any unwed father who has filed with the State a notice of his intent to claim paternity. The State submits that it need not give notice to anyone who has not filed his name, as he is permitted to do, and who is not otherwise within the designated catego*274ries, even if his identity and interest are known or are reasonably ascertainable by the State.

I am unpersuaded by the State’s position. In the first place, § 111-a defines six categories of unwed fathers to whom notice must be given even though they have not placed their names on file pursuant to the section. Those six categories, however, do not include fathers such as Lehr who have initiated filiation proceedings, even though their identity and interest are as clearly and easily ascertainable as those fathers in the six categories. Initiating such proceedings necessarily involves a formal acknowledgment of paternity, and requiring the State to take note of such a case in connection with pending adoption proceedings would be a trifling burden, no more than the State undertakes when there is a final adjudication in a paternity action.6 Indeed, there would appear to be more reason to give notice to those such as Lehr who acknowledge paternity than to those who have been adjudged to be a father in a contested paternity action.

The State asserts that any problem in this respect is overcome by the seventh category of putative fathers to whom notice must be given, namely, those fathers who have identified themselves in the putative fathers’ register maintained by the State. Since Lehr did not take advantage of this device to make his interest known, the State contends, he was not entitled to notice and a hearing even though his identity, location, and interest were known to the adoption court prior to entry of the adoption order. I have difficulty with this po*275sition. First, it represents a grudging and crabbed approach to due process. The State is quite willing to give notice and a hearing to putative fathers who have made themselves known by resorting to the putative fathers’ register. It makes little sense to me to deny notice and hearing to a father who has not placed his name in the register but who has unmistakably identified himself by filing suit to establish his paternity and has notified the adoption court of his action and his interest. I thus need not question the statutory scheme on its face. Even assuming that Lehr would have been foreclosed if his failure to utilize the register had somehow disadvantaged the State, he effectively made himself known by other means, and it is the sheerest formalism to deny him a hearing because he informed the State in the wrong manner.7

No state interest is substantially served by denying Lehr adequate notice and a hearing. The State no doubt has an interest in expediting adoption proceedings to prevent a child from remaining unduly long in the custody of the State or foster parents. But this is not an adoption involving a child in the custody of an authorized state agency. Here the child is in the custody of the mother and will remain in her custody. Moreover, had Lehr utilized the putative fathers’ register, he would have been granted a prompt hearing, and there was no justifiable reason, in terms of delay, to refüse him a hearing in the circumstances of this case.

The State’s undoubted interest in the finality of adoption orders likewise is not well served by a procedure that will *276deny notice and a hearing to a father whose identity and location are known. As this case well illustrates, denying notice and a hearing to such a father may result in years of additional litigation and threaten the reopening of adoption proceedings and the vacation of the adoption. Here, the Family Court’s unseemly rush to enter an adoption order after ordering that cause be shown why the filiation proceeding should not be transferred and consolidated with the adoption proceeding can hardly be justified by the interest in finality. To the contrary, the adoption order entered in March 1979 has remained open to question until this very day.

Because in my view the failure to provide Lehr with notice and an opportunity to be heard violated rights guaranteed him by the Due Process Clause, I need not address the question whether § 111-a violates the Equal Protection Clause by discriminating between categories of unwed fathers or by discriminating on the basis of gender.

Respectfully, I dissent.

Justice Scalia

announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion, in which The Chief Justice joins, and in all but footnote 6 of which Justice O’Connor and Justice Kennedy join.

Under California law, a child born to a married woman living with her husband is presumed to be a child of the marriage. Cal. Evid. Code Ann. § 621 (West Supp. 1989). The presumption of legitimacy may be rebutted only by the husband or wife, and then only in limited circumstances. Ibid. The instant appeal presents the claim that this presumption infringes upon the due process rights of a man who wishes to establish his paternity of a child born to the wife of another man, and the claim that it infringes upon the constitutional right of the child to maintain a relationship with her natural father.

I

The facts of this case are, we must hope, extraordinary. On May 9, 1976, in Las Vegas, Nevada, Carole D., an international model, and Gerald D., a top executive in a French oil company, were married. The couple established a home in Playa del Rey, California, in which they resided as husband and wife when one or the other was not out of the country on business. In the summer of 1978, Carole became involved in an adulterous affair with a neighbor, Michael H. In September 1980, she conceived a child, Victoria D., who was born on May 11, 1981. Gerald was listed as father on the birth certificate and has always held Victoria out to the world as his *114daughter. Soon after delivery of the child, however, Carole informed Michael that she believed he might be the father.

In the first three years of her life, Victoria remained always with Carole, but found herself within a variety of quasi-family units. In October 1981, Gerald moved to New York City to pursue his business interests, but Carole chose to remain in California. At the end of that month, Carole and Michael had blood tests of themselves and Victoria, which showed a 98.07% probability that Michael was Victoria’s father. In January 1982, Carole visited Michael in St. Thomas, where his primary business interests were based. There Michael held Victoria out as his child. In March, however, Carole left Michael and returned to California, where she took up residence with yet another man, Scott K. Later that spring, and again in the summer, Carole and Victoria spent time with Gerald in New York City, as well as on vacation in Europe. In the fall, they returned to Scott in California.

In November 1982, rebuffed in his attempts to visit Victoria, Michael filed a filiation action in California Superior Court to establish his paternity and right to visitation. In March 1983, the court appointed an attorney and guardian ad litem to represent Victoria’s interests. Victoria then filed a cross-complaint asserting that if she had more than one psychological or defacto father, she was entitled to maintain her filial relationship, with all of the attendant rights, duties, and obligations, with both. In May 1983, Carole filed a motion for summary judgment. During this period, from March through July 1983, Carole was again living with Gerald in New York. In August, however, she returned to California, became involved once again with Michael, and instructed her attorneys to remove the summary judgment motion from the calendar.

For the ensuing eight months, when Michael was not in St. Thomas he lived with Carole and Victoria in Carole’s apartment in Los Angeles and held Victoria out as his daughter. In April 1984, Carole and Michael signed a stipulation that *115Michael was Victoria’s natural father. Carole left Michael the next month, however, and instructed her attorneys not to file the stipulation. In June 1984, Carole reconciled with Gerald and joined him in New York, where they now live with Victoria and two other children since born into the marriage.

In May 1984, Michael and Victoria, through her guardian ad litem, sought visitation rights for Michael pendente lite. To assist in determining whether visitation would be in Victoria’s best interests, the Superior Court appointed a psychologist to evaluate Victoria, Gerald, Michael, and Carole. The psychologist recommended that Carole retain sole custody, but that Michael be allowed continued contact with Victoria pursuant to a restricted visitation schedule. The court concurred and ordered that Michael be provided with limited visitation privileges pendente lite.

On October 19, 1984, Gerald, who had intervened in the action, moved for summary judgment on the ground that under Cal. Evid. Code § 621 there were no triable issues of fact as to Victoria’s paternity. This law provides that “the issue of a wife cohabiting with her husband, who is not impotent or sterile, is conclusively presumed to be a child of the marriage.” Cal. Evid. Code Ann. § 621(a) (West Supp. 1989). The presumption may be rebutted by blood tests, but only if a motion for such tests is made, within two years from the date of the child’s birth, either by the husband or, if the natural father has filed an affidavit acknowledging paternity, by the wife. §§ 621(c) and (d).

On January 28, 1985, having found that affidavits submitted by Carole and Gerald sufficed to demonstrate that the two were cohabiting at conception and birth and that Gerald was neither sterile nor impotent, the Superior Court granted Gerald’s motion for summary judgment, rejecting Michael’s and Victoria’s challenges to the constitutionality of §621. The court also denied their motions for continued visitation pending the appeal under Cal. Civ. Code §4601, which provides that a court may, in its discretion, grant “reasonable *116visitation rights ... to any . . . person having an interest in the welfare of the child.” Cal. Civ. Code Ann. §4601 (West Supp. 1989). It found that allowing such visitation would “violat[e] the intention of the Legislature by impugning the integrity of the family unit.” Supp. App. to Juris. Statement A-91.

On appeal, Michael asserted, inter alia, that the Superior Court’s application of §621 had violated his procedural and substantive due process rights. Victoria also raised a due process challenge to the statute, seeking to preserve her de facto relationship with Michael as well as with Gerald. She contended, in addition, that as § 621 allows the husband and, at least to a limited extent, the mother, but not the child, to rebut the presumption of legitimacy, it violates the child’s right to equal protection. Finally, she asserted a right to continued visitation with Michael under §4601. After submission of briefs and a hearing, the California Court of Appeal affirmed the judgment of the Superior Court and upheld the constitutionality of the statute. 191 Cal. App. 3d 995, 236 Cal. Rptr. 810 (1987). It interpreted that judgment, moreover, as having denied permanent visitation rights under §4601, regarding that as the implication of the Superior Court’s reliance upon § 621 and upon an earlier California case, Vincent B. v. Joan R., 126 Cal. App. 3d 619, 179 Cal. Rptr. 9 (1981), appeal dism’d, 459 U. S. 807 (1982), which had held that once an assertion of biological paternity is “determined to be legally impossible” under § 621, visitation against the wishes of the mother should be denied under § 4601. 126 Cal. App. 3d, at 627-628, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 13.

The Court of Appeal denied Michael’s and Victoria’s petitions for rehearing, and, on July 30, 1987, the California Supreme Court denied discretionary review. On February 29, 1988, we noted probable jurisdiction of the present appeal. 485 U. S. 903. Before us, Michael and Victoria both raise equal protection and due process challenges. We do not reach Michael’s equal protection claim, however, as it *117was neither raised nor passed upon below. See Bankers Life & Casualty Co. v. Crenshaw, 486 U. S. 71 (1988).

( — I I — I

The California statute that is the subject of this litigation is, in substance, more than a century old. California Code of Civ. Proc. § 1962(5), enacted in 1872, provided that “[t]he issue of a wife cohabiting with her husband, who is not impotent, is indisputably presumed to be legitimate.” In 1955, the legislature amended the statute by adding the preface: “Notwithstanding any other provision of law.” 1955 Cal. Stats., ch. 948, p. 1835, §3. In 1965, when California’s Evidence Code was adopted, the statute was codified as § 621, with no substantive change except replacement of the word “indisputably” with “conclusively,” 1965 Cal. Stats., ch. 299, §2, pp. 1297, 1308. When California adopted the Uniform Parentage Act, 1975 Cal. Stats., ch. 1244, §11, pp. 3196-3201, codified at Cal. Civ. Code Ann. §7000 et seq. (West 1983), it amended §621 by replacing the word “legitimate” with the phrase “a child of the marriage” and by adding nonsterility to nonimpotence and cohabitation as a predicate for the presumption. 1975 Cal. Stats., ch. 1244, §13, p. 3202. In 1980, the legislature again amended the statute to provide the husband an opportunity to introduce blood-test evidence in rebuttal of the presumption, 1980 Cal. Stats., ch. 1310, p. 4433; and in 1981 amended it to provide the mother such an opportunity, 1981 Cal. Stats., ch. 1180, p. 4761. In their present form, the substantive provisions of the statute are as follows:

Ҥ 621. Child of the marriage; notice of motion for blood tests

“(a) Except as provided in subdivision (b), the issue of a wife cohabiting with her husband, who is not impotent or sterile, is conclusively presumed to be a child of the marriage.

*118“(b) Notwithstanding the provisions of subdivision (a), if the court finds that the conclusions of all the experts, as disclosed by the evidence based upon blood tests performed pursuant to Chapter 2 (commencing with Section 890) of Division 7 are that the husband is not the father of the child, the question of paternity of the husband shall be resolved accordingly.

“(c) The notice of motion for blood tests under subdivision (b) may be raised by the husband not later than two years from the child’s date of birth.

“(d) The notice of motion for blood tests under subdivision (b) may be raised by the mother of the child not later than two years from the child’s date of birth if the child’s biological father has filed an affidavit with the court acknowledging paternity of the child.

“(e) The provisions of subdivision (b) shall not apply to any case coming within the provisions of Section 7005 of the Civil Code [dealing with artificial insemination] or to any case in which the wife, with the consent of the husband, conceived by means of a surgical procedure.”

Ill

We address first the claims of Michael. At the outset, it is necessary to clarify what he sought and what he was denied. California law, like nature itself, makes no provision for dual fatherhood. Michael was seeking to be declared the father of Victoria. The immediate benefit he evidently sought to obtain from that status was visitation rights. See Cal. Civ. Code Ann. §4601 (West 1983) (parent has statutory right to visitation “unless it is shown that such visitation would be detrimental to the best interests of the child”). But if Michael were successful in being declared the father, other rights would follow — most importantly, the right to be considered as the parent who should have custody, Cal. Civ. Code Ann. § 4600 (West 1983), a status which “embrace[s] the sum of parental rights with respect to the rearing of a child, including the child’s care; the right to the child’s services and *119earnings; the right to direct the child’s activities; the right to make decisions regarding the control, education, and health of the child; and the right, as well as the duty, to prepare the child for additional obligations, which includes the teaching of moral standards, religious beliefs, and elements of good citizenship.” 4 California Family Law §60.02[l][b] (C. Markey ed. 1987) (footnotes omitted). All parental rights, including visitation, were automatically denied by denying Michael status as the father. While Cal. Civ. Code Ann. § 4601 places it within the discretionary power of a court to award visitation rights to a nonparent, the Superior Court here, affirmed by the Court of Appeal, held that California law denies visitation, against the wishes of the mother, to a putative father who has been prevented by § 621 from establishing his paternity. See 191 Cal. App. 3d, at 1013, 236 Cal. Rptr., at 821, citing Vincent B. v. Joan R., 126 Cal. App. 3d, at 627-628 179 Cal. Rptr., at 13.

Michael raises two related challenges to the constitutionality of §621. First, he asserts that requirements of procedural due process prevent the State from terminating his liberty interest in his relationship with his child without affording him an opportunity to demonstrate his paternity in an evidentiary hearing. We believe this claim derives from a fundamental misconception of the nature of the California statute. While § 621 is phrased in terms of a presumption, that rule of evidence is the implementation of a substantive rule of law. California declares it to be, except in limited circumstances, irrelevant for paternity purposes whether a child conceived during, and born into, an existing marriage was begotten by someone other than the husband and had a prior relationship with him. As the Court of Appeal phrased it:

“ ‘The conclusive presumption is actually a substantive rule of law based upon a determination by the Legislature as a matter of overriding social policy, that given a certain relationship between the husband and wife, the husband is to be held responsible for the child, and that *120the integrity of the family unit should not be impugned.’” 191 Cal. App. 3d, at 1005, 236 Cal. Rptr., at 816, quoting Vincent B. v. Joan R., supra, at 623, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 10.

Of course the conclusive presumption not only expresses the State’s substantive policy but also furthers it, excluding inquiries into the child’s paternity that would be destructive of family integrity and privacy.1

This Court has struck down as illegitimate certain “irrebut-table presumptions.” See, e. g., Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972); Vlandis v. Kline, 412 U. S. 441 (1973); Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur, 414 U. S. 632 (1974). Those holdings did not, however, rest upon procedural due process. A conclusive presumption does, of course, foreclose the person against whom it is invoked from demonstrating, in a particularized proceeding, that applying the presumption to him will in fact not further the lawful governmental policy the presumption is designed to effectuate. But the same can be said of any legal rule that establishes general classifications, whether framed in terms of a presumption or not. In this respect there is no difference between a rule which says that the marital husband shall be irrebuttably presumed to be the father, and a rule which says that the adulterous natural father shall not be recognized as the legal father. Both rules deny someone in Michael’s situation a hearing on whether, in the particular circumstances of his case, California’s policies would best be served by giving him parental rights. Thus, as many commentators have observed, see, e. g., Bezanson, Some Thoughts on the Emerging Irrebuttable Presumption Doctrine, 7 Ind. L. Rev. 644 (1974); Nowak, Realigning *121the Standards of Review Under the Equal Protection Guarantee-Prohibited, Neutral, and Permissive Classifications, 62 Geo. L. J. 1071, 1102-1106 (1974); Note, Irrebuttable Presumptions: An Illusory Analysis, 27 Stan. L. Rev. 449 (1975); Note, The Irrebuttable Presumption Doctrine in the Supreme Court, 87 Harv. L. Rev. 1534 (1974), our “irre-buttable presumption” cases must ultimately be analyzed as calling into question not the adequacy of procedures but— like our cases involving classifications framed in other terms, see, e. g., Craig v. Boren, 429 U. S. 190 (1976); Carrington v. Rash, 380 U. S. 89 (1965) — the adequacy of the “fit” between the classification and the policy that the classification serves. See LaFleur, supra, at 652 (Powell, J., concurring in result); Vlandis, supra, at 456-459 (White, J., concurring), 466-469 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting); Weinberger v. Salfi, 422 U. S. 749 (1975). We therefore reject Michael’s procedural due process challenge and proceed to his substantive claim.

Michael contends as a matter of substantive due process that, because he has established a parental relationship with Victoria, protection of Gerald’s and Carole’s marital union is an insufficient state interest to support termination of that relationship. This argument is, of course, predicated on the assertion that Michael has a constitutionally protected liberty interest in his relationship with Victoria.

It is an established part of our constitutional jurisprudence that the term “liberty” in the Due Process Clause extends beyond freedom from physical restraint. See, e. g., Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510 (1925); Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390 (1923). Without that core textual meaning as a limitation, defining the scope of the Due Process Clause “has at times been a treacherous field for this Court,” giving “reason for concern lest the only limits to . . . judicial intervention become the predilections of those who happen at the time to be Members of this Court.” Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494, 502 (1977). The need for restraint has been cogently expressed by Justice White:

*122“That the Court has ample precedent for the creation of new constitutional rights should not lead it to repeat the process at will. The Judiciary, including this Court, is the most vulnerable and comes nearest to illegitimacy when it deals with judge-made constitutional law having little or no cognizable roots in the language or even the design of the Constitution. Realizing that the present construction of the Due Process Clause represents a major judicial gloss on its terms, as well as on the anticipation of the Framers . . . , the Court should be extremely reluctant to breathe still further substantive content into the Due Process Clause so as to strike down legislation adopted by a State or city to promote its welfare. Whenever the Judiciary does so, it unavoidably pre-empts for itself another part of the governance of the country without express constitutional authority.” Moore, supra, at 544 (dissenting opinion).

In an attempt to limit and guide interpretation of the Clause, we have insisted not merely that the interest denominated as a “liberty” be “fundamental” (a concept that, in isolation, is hard to objectify), but also that it be an interest traditionally protected by our society.2 As we have put it, the Due Process Clause affords only those protections “so rooted in the traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as fundamental.” Snyder v. Massachusetts, 291 U. S. 97, 105 (1934) (Cardozo, J.). Our cases reflect “continual insistence upon respect for the teachings of history [and] solid recogni*123tion of the basic values that underlie our society. ...” Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479, 501 (1965) (Harlan, J., concurring in judgment).

This insistence that the asserted liberty interest be rooted in history and tradition is evident, as elsewhere, in our cases according constitutional protection to certain parental rights. Michael reads the landmark case of Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972), and the subsequent cases of Quilloin v. Walcott, 434 U. S. 246 (1978), Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 (1979), and Lehr v. Robertson, 463 U. S. 248 (1983), as establishing that a liberty interest is created by biological fatherhood plus an established parental relationship-factors that exist in the present case as well. We think that distorts the rationale of those cases. As we view them, they rest not upon such isolated factors but upon the historic respect — indeed, sanctity would not be too strong a term — traditionally accorded to the relationships that develop within the unitary family.3 See Stanley, supra, at 651; Quilloin, supra, at 254-255; Caban, supra, at 389; Lehr, supra, at 261. In Stanley, for example, we forbade the destruction of such a family when, upon the death of the mother, the State had sought to remove children from the custody of a father who had lived with and supported them and their mother for 18 years. As Justice Powell stated for the plurality in Moore v. East Cleveland, supra, at 503: “Our *124decisions establish that the Constitution protects the sanctity of the family precisely because the institution of the family is deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.”

Thus, the legal issue in the present case reduces to whether the relationship between persons in the situation of Michael and Victoria has been treated as a protected family unit under the historic practices of our society, or whether on any other basis it has been accorded special protection. We think it impossible to find that it has. In fact, quite to the contrary, our traditions have protected the marital family (Gerald, Carole, and the child they acknowledge to be theirs) against the sort of claim Michael asserts.4

The presumption of legitimacy was a fundamental principle of the common law. H. Nicholas, Adulturine Bastardy 1 (1836). Traditionally, that presumption could be rebutted only by proof that a husband was incapable of procreation or had had no access to his wife during the relevant period. Id., at 9-10 (citing Bracton, De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliae, bk. i, ch. 9, p. 6; bk. ii, ch. 29, p. 63, ch. 32, p. 70 (1569)). As explained by Blackstone, nonaccess could only be proved “if the husband be out of the kingdom of England (or, as the law somewhat loosely phrases it, extra quatuor maria [beyond the four seas]) for above nine months. . . .” 1 Blackstone’s Commentaries 456 (J. Chitty ed. 1826). And, under the common law both in England and here, “neither *125husband nor wife [could] be a witness to prove access or nonaccess.” J. Schouler, Law of the Domestic Relations §225, p. 306 (3d ed. 1882); R. Graveson & F. Crane, A Century of Family Law: 1857-1957, p. 158 (1957). The primary policy rationale underlying the common law’s severe restrictions on rebuttal of the presumption appears to have been an aversion to declaring children illegitimate, see Schouler, supra, §225, at 306-307; M. Grossberg, Governing the Hearth 201 (1985), thereby depriving them of rights of inheritance and succession, 2 J. Kent, Commentaries on American Law *175, and likely making them wards of the state. A secondary policy concern was the interest in promoting the “peace and tranquillity of States and families,” Schouler, supra, §225, at 304, quoting Boullenois, Traité des Status, bk. 1, p. 62, a goal that is obviously impaired by facilitating suits against husband and wife asserting that their children are illegitimate. Even though, as bastardy laws became less harsh, “[j]udges in both [England and the United States] gradually widened the acceptable range of evidence that could be offered by spouses, and placed restraints on the 'four seas rule’ ...[,] the law retained a strong bias against ruling the children of married women illegitimate.” Grossberg, supra, at 202.

We have found nothing in the older sources, nor in the older cases, addressing specifically the power of the natural father to assert parental rights over a child born into a woman’s existing marriage with another man. Since it is Michael’s burden to establish that such a power (at least where the natural father has established a relationship with the child) is so deeply embedded within our traditions as to be a fundamental right, the lack of evidence alone might defeat his case. But the evidence shows that even in modern times — when, as we have noted, the rigid protection of the marital family has in other respects been relaxed — the ability of a person in Michael’s position to claim paternity has not been generally acknowledged. For example, a 1957 annotation on the subject: “Who may dispute presumption of legitimacy of *126child conceived or born during wedlock,” 53 A. L. R. 2d 572, shows three States (including California) with statutes limiting standing to the husband or wife and their descendants, one State (Louisiana) with a statute limiting it to the husband, two States (Florida and Texas) with judicial decisions limiting standing to the husband, and two States (Illinois and New York) with judicial decisions denying standing even to the mother. Not a single decision is set forth specifically according standing to the natural father, and “express indications of the nonexistence of any . . . limitation” upon standing were found only “in a few jurisdictions.” Id., at 579.

Moreover, even if it were clear that one in Michael’s position generally possesses, and has generally always possessed, standing to challenge the marital child’s legitimacy, that would still not establish Michael’s case. As noted earlier, what is at issue here is not entitlement to a state pronouncement that Victoria was begotten by Michael. It is no conceivable denial of constitutional right for a State to decline to declare facts unless some legal consequence hinges upon the requested declaration. What Michael asserts here is a right to have himself declared the natural father and thereby to obtain parental prerogatives5 What he must establish, therefore, is not that our society has traditionally allowed a natural father in his circumstances to establish paternity, but that it has traditionally accorded such a father parental rights, or at least has not traditionally denied them. Even if the law in all States had always been that the entire world could chal*127lenge the marital presumption and obtain a declaration as to who was the natural father, that would not advance Michael’s claim. Thus, it is ultimately irrelevant, even for purposes of determining carretil: social attitudes towards the alleged substantive right Michael asserts, that the present law in a number of States appears to allow the natural father — including the natural father who has not established a relationship with the child — the theoretical power to rebut the marital presumption, see Note, Rebutting the Marital Presumption: A Developed Relationship Test, SS Colum. L. Rev. 369, 373 (19SS). What counts is whether the States in fact award substantive parental rights to the natural father of a child conceived within, and born into, an extant marital union that wishes to embrace the child. We are not aware of a single case, old or new, that has done so. This is not the stuff of which fundamental rights qualifying as liberty interests are made.6

*128In Lehr v. Robertson, a case involving a natural father’s attempt to block his child’s adoption by the unwed mother’s new husband, we observed that “[t]he significance of the biological connection is that it offers the natural fathér an opportunity that no other male possesses to develop a relationship *129with his offspring,” 463 U. S., at 262, and we assumed that the Constitution might require some protection of that opportunity, id., at 262-265. Where, however, the child is born into an extant marital family, the natural father’s unique opportunity conflicts with the similarly unique opportunity of the husband of the marriage; and it is not unconstitutional for the State to give categorical preference to the latter. In Lehr we quoted approvingly from Justice Stewart’s dissent in Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S., at 397, to the effect that although “‘[i]n some circumstances the actual relationship between father and child may suffice to create in the unwed father parental interests comparable to those of the married father,”’ “‘the absence of a legal tie with the mother may in such circumstances appropriately place a limit on whatever substantive constitutional claims might otherwise exist.’” 463 U. S., at 260, n. 16. In accord with our traditions, a limit is also imposed by the circumstance that the mother is, at the time of the child’s conception and birth, married to, and cohabitating with, another man, both of whom wish to raise the child as the offspring of their union.7 It is a question of legislative policy and not constitutional law whether *130California will allow the presumed parenthood of a couple desiring to retain a child conceived within and born into their marriage to be rebutted.

We do not accept Justice Brennan’s criticism that this result “squashes” the liberty that consists of “the freedom not to conform.” Post, at 141. It seems to us that reflects the erroneous view that there is only one side to this controversy — that one disposition can expand a “liberty” of sorts without contracting an equivalent “liberty” on the other side. Such a happy choice is rarely available. Here, to provide protection to an adulterous natural father is to deny protection to a marital father, and vice versa. If Michael has a “freedom not to conform” (whatever that means), Gerald must equivalently have a “freedom to conform.” One of them will pay a price for asserting that “freedom” — Michael by being unable to act as father of the child he has adulter-ously begotten, or Gerald by being unable to preserve the integrity of the traditional family unit he and Victoria have established. Our disposition does not choose between these two “freedoms,” but leaves that to the people of California. Justice Brennan’s approach chooses one of them as the constitutional imperative, on no apparent basis except that the unconventional is to be preferred.

> t — (

We have never had occasion to decide whether a child has a liberty interest, symmetrical with that of her parent, in maintaining her filial relationship. We need not do so here because, even assuming that such a right exists, Victoria’s claim must fail. Victoria’s due process challenge is, if anything, weaker than Michael’s. Her basic claim is not that California has erred in preventing her from establishing that Michael, not Gerald, should stand as her legal father. Rather, she claims a due process right to maintain filial relationships with both Michael and Gerald. This assertion merits little discussion, for, whatever the merits of the guardian *131ad litem’s belief that such an arrangement can be of great psychological benefit to a child, the claim that a State must recognize multiple fatherhood has no support in the history or traditions of this country. Moreover, even if we were to construe Victoria’s argument as forwarding the lesser proposition that, whatever her status vis-a-vis Gerald, she has a liberty interest in maintaining a filial relationship with her natural father, Michael, we find that, at best, her claim is the obverse of Michael’s and fails for the same reasons.

Victoria claims in addition that her equal protection rights have been violated because, unlike her mother and presumed father, she had no opportunity to rebut the presumption of her legitimacy. We find this argument wholly without merit. We reject, at the outset, Victoria’s suggestion that her equal protection challenge must be assessed under a standard of strict scrutiny because, in denying her the right to maintain a filial relationship with Michael, the State is discriminating against her on the basis of her illegitimacy. See Gomez v. Perez, 409 U. S. 535, 538 (1973). Illegitimacy is a legal construct, not a natural trait. Under California law, Victoria is not illegitimate, and she is treated in the same manner as all other legitimate children: she is entitled to maintain a filial relationship with her legal parents.

We apply, therefore, the ordinary “rational relationship” test to Victoria’s equal protection challenge. The primary rationale underlying §621’s limitation on those who may rebut the presumption of legitimacy is a concern that allowing person's other than the husband or wife to do so may undermine the integrity of the marital union. When the husband or wife contests the legitimacy of their child, the stability of the marriage has already been shaken. In contrast, allowing a claim of illegitimacy to be pressed by the child — or, more accurately, by a court-appointed guardian ad litem — may well disrupt an otherwise peaceful union. Since it pursues a legitimate end by rational means, California’s de-*132cisión to treat Victoria differently from her parents is not a denial of equal protection.

The judgment of the California Court of Appeal is

Affirmed.

Justice O’Connor,

with whom Justice Kennedy joins,

concurring in part.

I concur in all but footnote 6 of Justice Scalia’s opinion. This footnote sketches a mode of historical analysis to be used when identifying liberty interests protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment that may be somewhat inconsistent with our past decisions in this area. See Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479 (1965); Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U. S. 438 (1972). On occasion the Court has characterized relevant traditions protecting asserted rights at levels of generality that might not be “the most specific level” available. Ante, at 127-128, n. 6. See Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1, 12 (1967); Turner v. Safley, 482 U. S. 78, 94 (1987); cf. United States v. Stanley, 483 U. S. 669, 709 (1987) (O’Connor, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). I would not foreclose the unanticipated by the prior imposition of a single mode of historical analysis. Poe v. Ullman, 367 U. S. 497, 542, 544 (1961) (Harlan, J., dissenting).

Justice Stevens,

concurring in the judgment.

As I understand this case, it raises two different questions about the validity of California’s statutory scheme. First, is Cal. Evid. Code Ann. §621 (West Supp. 1989) unconstitutional because it prevents Michael and Victoria from obtaining a judicial determination that he is her biological father-even if no legal rights would be affected by that determination? Second, does the California statute deny appellants a fair opportunity to prove that Victoria’s best interests would be served by granting Michael visitation rights?

On the first issue I agree with Justice Scalia that the Federal Constitution imposes no obligation upon a State to *133“declare facts unless some legal consequence hinges upon the requested declaration.” Ante, at 126. “The actions of judges neither create nor sever genetic bonds.” Lehr v. Robertson, 463 U. S. 248, 261 (1983).

On the second issue I do not agree with Justice Scalia’s analysis. He seems to reject the possibility that a natural father might ever have a constitutionally protected interest in his relationship with a child whose mother was married to, and cohabiting with, another man at the time of the child’s conception and birth. I think cases like Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972), and Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 (1979), demonstrate that enduring “family” relationships may develop in unconventional settings. I therefore would not foreclose the possibility that a constitutionally protected relationship between a natural father and his child might exist in a case like this. Indeed, I am willing to assume for the purpose of deciding this case that Michael’s relationship with Victoria is strong enough to give him a constitutional right to try to convince a trial judge that Victoria’s best interest would be served by granting him visitation rights. I am satisfied, however, that the California statute, as applied in this case, gave him that opportunity.

Section 4601 of the California Civil Code Annotated (West Supp. 1989) provides:

“[Rjeasonable visitation rights [shall be awarded] to a parent unless it is shown that the visitation would be detrimental to the best interests of the child. In the discretion of the court, reasonable visitation rights may be granted to any other person having an interest in the ivelfare of the child.” (Emphasis added.)

The presumption established by §621 denied Michael the benefit of the first sentence of § 4601 because, as a matter of law, he is not a “parent.” It does not, however, prevent him from proving that he is an “other person having an interest in the welfare of the child.” On its face, therefore, the statute *134plainly gave the trial judge the authority to grant Michael “reasonable visitation rights.”

I recognize that my colleagues have interpreted § 621 as creating an absolute bar that would prevent a California trial judge from regarding the natural father as either a “parent” within the meaning of the first sentence of § 4601 or as “any other person” within the meaning of the second sentence. See ante, at 116, 119; post, at 148-151 (Brennan, J., dissenting). That is not only an unnatural reading of the statute’s plain language, but it is also not consistent with the California courts’ reading of the statute. Thus, in Vincent B. v. Joan R., 126 Cal. App. 3d 619,179 Cal. Rptr. 9 (1981), appeal dism’d, 459 U. S. 807 (1982), the California Court of Appeal, after deciding that the § 621 presumption barred a natural father from proving paternity, went on to consider the separate question whether it would be proper to allow visitation pursuant to the second sentence of §4601:

“Finally, appellant contends that even if Frank is conclusively presumed to be Z.’s father, appellant should be allowed visitation rights, since Civil Code section 4601 gives discretion to grant visitation rights to ‘any other person having an interest in the welfare of the child.’ We think it obvious that in the circumstances of this case such court-ordered visitation would be detrimental to the best interests of the child. Appellant’s interest in visiting the child is based on his claim that appellant is Z.’s father. Such claim is now determined to be legally impossible. The mother does not wish the child to be visited by appellant. Confusion, uncertainty, and embarrassment to the child would likely result from a court order that appellant, who claims to be Z.’s biological father, is entitled to visitation against the wishes of the mother. (Petitioner F. v. Respondent R., supra, 430 A. 2d 1075, 1080.)” 126 Cal. App. 3d, at 627-628, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 13 (emphasis added).

*135Supporting the court’s decision that granting visitation rights to Vincent would be contrary to the child’s best interests was the fact that “unlike the putative fathers in Stanley [v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972),] and [In re] Lisa R. [, 13 Cal. 3d 636, 532 P. 2d 123 (1975)], appellant has never lived with the mother and child, nor has he ever supported the child.” 126 Cal. App. 3d, at 626, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 12.

Similarly, in this case, the trial judge not only found the conclusive presumption applicable, but also separately considered the effect of § 4601 and expressly found “that, at the present time, it is not in the best interests of the child that the Plaintiff have visitation. The Court believes that the existence of two (2) ‘fathers’ as male authority figures will confuse the child and be counter-productive to her best interests.” Supp. App. to Juris. Statement A-90 — A-91. In its opinion, the Court of Appeal also concluded that Michael “is not entitled to rights of visitation under section 4601,” see 191 Cal. App. 3d 995, 1013, 236 Cal. Rptr. 810, 821 (1987), and then quoted the above excerpt from the opinion in Vincent B. v. Joan R. As I read that opinion, it does not support the view that a natural father cannot be an “other person” within the meaning of §4601; rather, it indicates that the outcome depends largely on “the circumstances of th[e] case.”*

Under the circumstances of the case before us, Michael was given a fair opportunity to show that he is Victoria’s natural father, that he had developed a relationship with her, and that her interests would be served by granting him visitation rights. On the other hand, the record also shows that after its rather shaky start, the marriage between Carole and Gerald developed a stability that now provides Victoria with *136a loving and harmonious family home. In the circumstances of this case, I find nothing fundamentally unfair about the exercise of a judge’s discretion that, in the end, allows the mother to decide whether her child’s best interests would be served by allowing the natural father visitation privileges. Because I am convinced that the trial judge had the authority under state law both to hear Michael’s plea for visitation rights and to grant him such rights if Victoria’s best interests so warranted, I am satisfied that the California statutory scheme is consistent with the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

I therefore concur in the Court’s judgment of affirmance.

Justice Brennan,

with whom Justice Marshall and Justice Blackmun join,

dissenting.

In a case that has yielded so many opinions as has this one, it is fruitful to begin by emphasizing the common ground shared by a majority of this Court. Five Members of the Court refuse to foreclose “the possibility that a natural father might ever have a constitutionally protected interest in his relationship with a child whose mother was married to, and cohabiting with, another man at the time of the child’s conception and birth.” Ante, at 133 (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment); see infra, at 141-147; post, at 157 (White, J., dissenting). Five Justices agree that the flaw inhering in a conclusive presumption that terminates a constitutionally protected interest without any hearing whatsoever is a procedural one. See infra, at 153; post, at 163 (White, J., dissenting); ante, at 132 (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment). Four Members of the Court agree that Michael H. has a liberty interest in his relationship with Victoria, see infra, at 143; post, at 157 (White, J., dissenting), and one assumes for purposes of this case that he does, see ante, at 133 (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment).

In contrast, only one other Member of the Court fully endorses Justice Scalia’s view of the proper method of analyzing questions arising under the Due Process Clause. *137See ante, at 113; ante, at 132 (O’Connor, J., concurring in part). Nevertheless, because the plurality opinion’s exclusively historical analysis portends a significant and unfortunate departure from our prior cases and from sound constitutional decisionmaking, I devote a substantial portion of my discussion to it.

I

Once we recognized that the “liberty” protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment encompasses more than freedom from bodily restraint, today’s plurality opinion emphasizes, the concept was cut loose from one natural limitation on its meaning. This innovation paved the way, so the plurality hints, for judges to substitute their own preferences for those of elected officials. Dissatisfied with this supposedly unbridled and uncertain state of affairs, the plurality casts about for another limitation on the concept of liberty.

It finds this limitation in “tradition.” Apparently oblivious to the fact that this concept can be as malleable and as elusive as “liberty” itself, the plurality pretends that tradition places a discernible border around the Constitution. The pretense is seductive; it would be comforting to believe that a search for “tradition” involves nothing more idiosyncratic or complicated than poring through dusty volumes on American history. Yet, as Justice White observed in his dissent in Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494, 549 (1977): “What the deeply rooted traditions of the country are is arguable.” Indeed, wherever I would begin to look for an interest “deeply rooted in the country’s traditions,” one thing is certain: I would not stop (as does the plurality) at Bracton, or Blackstone, or Kent, or even the American Law Reports in conducting my search. Because reasonable people can disagree about the content of particular traditions, and because they can disagree even about which traditions are relevant to the definition of “liberty,” the plurality has not found the objective boundary that it seeks.

*138Even if we could agree, moreover, on the content and significance of particular traditions, we still would be forced to identify the point at which a tradition becomes firm enough to be relevant to our definition of liberty and the moment at which it becomes too obsolete to be relevant any longer. The plurality supplies no objective means by which we might make these determinations. Indeed, as soon as the plurality sees signs that the tradition upon which it bases its decision (the laws denying putative fathers like Michael standing to assert paternity) is crumbling, it shifts ground and says that the case has nothing to do with that tradition, after all. “[W]hat is at issue here,” the plurality asserts after canvassing the law on paternity suits, “is not entitlement to a state pronouncement that Victoria was begotten by Michael.” Ante, at 126. But that is precisely what is at issue here, and the plurality’s last-minute denial of this fact dramatically illustrates the subjectivity of its own analysis.

It is ironic that an approach so utterly dependent on tradition is so indifferent to our precedents. Citing barely a handful of this Court’s numerous decisions defining the scope of the liberty protected by the Due Process Clause to support its reliance on tradition, the plurality acts as though English legal treatises and the American Law Reports always have provided the sole source for our constitutional principles. They have not. Just as common-law notions no longer define the “property” that the Constitution protects, see Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U. S. 254 (1970), neither do they circumscribe the “liberty” that it guarantees. On the contrary, “‘[liberty’ and ‘property’ are broad and majestic terms. They are among the ‘[gjreat [constitutional] concepts . . . purposely left to gather meaning from experience. . . . [T]hey relate to the whole domain of social and economic fact, and the statesmen who founded this Nation knew too well that only a stagnant society remains unchanged.’” Board of Regents of State Colleges v. Roth, 408 U. S. 564, 571 (1972), quoting Na*139tional Ins. Co. v. Tidewater Co., 337 U. S. 582, 646 (1949) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting).

It is not that tradition has been irrelevant to our prior decisions. Throughout our decisionmaking in this important area runs the theme that certain interests and practices — freedom from physical restraint, marriage, childbearing, childrearing, and others — form the core of our definition of “liberty.” Our solicitude for these interests is partly the result of the fact that the Due Process Clause would seem an empty promise if it did not protect them, and partly the result of the historical and traditional importance of these interests in our society. In deciding cases arising under the Due Process Clause, therefore, we have considered whether the concrete limitation under consideration impermissibly impinges upon one of these more generalized interests.

Today’s plurality, however, does not ask whether parenthood is an interest that historically has received our attention and protection; the answer to that question is too clear for dispute. Instead, the plurality asks whether the specific variety of parenthood under consideration — a natural father’s relationship with a child whose mother is married to another man — has enjoyed such protection.

If we had looked to tradition with such specificity in past cases, many a decision would have reached a different result. Surely the use of contraceptives by unmarried couples, Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U. S. 438 (1972), or even by married couples, Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479 (1965); the freedom from corporal punishment in schools, Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U. S. 651 (1977); the freedom from an arbitrary transfer from a prison to a psychiatric institution, Vitek v. Jones, 445 U. S. 480 (1980); and even the right to raise one’s natural but illegitimate children, Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972), were not “interest[s] traditionally protected by our society,” ante, at 122, at the time of their consideration by this Court. If we had asked, therefore, in Eisen-stadt, Griswold, Ingraham, Vitek, or Stanley itself whether *140the specific interest under consideration had been traditionally protected, the answer would have been a resounding “no.” That we did not ask this question in those cases highlights the novelty of the interpretive method that the plurality opinion employs today.

The plurality’s interpretive method is more than novel; it is misguided. It ignores the good reasons for limiting the role of “tradition” in interpreting the Constitution’s deliberately capacious language. In the plurality’s constitutional universe, we may not take notice of the fact that the original reasons for the conclusive presumption of paternity are out of place in a world in which blood tests can prove virtually beyond a shadow of a doubt who sired a particular child and in which the fact of illegitimacy no longer plays the burdensome and stigmatizing role it once did. Nor, in the plurality’s world, may we deny “tradition” its full scope by pointing out that the rationale for the conventional rule has changed over the years, as has the rationale for Cal. Evid. Code Ann. § 621 (West Supp. 1989);1 instead, our task is simply to identify a rule denying the asserted interest and not to ask whether the basis for that rule — which is the true reflection of the values undergirding it — has changed too often or too recently to call the rule embodying that rationale a “tradition.” Moreover, by describing the decisive question as whether Michael’s and Victoria’s interest is one that has been “traditionally protected by our society,” ante, at 122 (emphasis added), rather than one that society traditionally has thought important (with or without protecting it), and by suggesting that our sole function is to “discern the society’s views,” ante, at 128, n. 6 (emphasis added), the plurality acts as if the only pur*141pose of the Due Process Clause is to confirm the importance of interests already protected by a majority of the States. Transforming the protection afforded by the Due Process Clause into a redundancy mocks those who, with care and purpose, wrote the Fourteenth Amendment.

In construing the Fourteenth Amendment to offer shelter only to 'those interests specifically protected by historical practice, moreover, the plurality ignores the kind of society in which our Constitution exists. We are not an assimila-tive, homogeneous society, but a facilitative, pluralistic one, in which we must be willing to abide someone else’s unfamiliar or even repellent practice because the same tolerant impulse protects our own idiosyncracies. Even if we can agree, therefore, that “family” and “parenthood” are part of the good life, it is absurd to assume that we can agree on the content of those terms and destructive to pretend that we do. In a community such as ours, “liberty” must include the freedom not to conform. The plurality today squashes this freedom by requiring specific approval from history before protecting anything in the name of liberty.

The document that the plurality construes today is unfamiliar to me. It is not the living charter that I have taken to be our Constitution; it is instead a stagnant, archaic, hidebound document steeped in the prejudices and superstitions of a time long past. This Constitution does not recognize that times change, does not see that sometimes a practice or rule outlives its foundations. I cannot accept an interpretive method that does such violence to the charter that I am bound by oath to uphold.

II

The plurality’s reworking of our interpretive approach is all the more troubling because it is unnecessary. This is not a case in which we face a “new” kind of interest, one that requires us to consider for the first time whether the Constitution protects it. On the contrary, we confront an interest — that of a parent and child in their relationship with each *142other — that was among the first that this Court acknowledged in its cases defining the “liberty” protected by the Constitution, see, e. g., Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390, 399 (1923); Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U. S. 535, 541 (1942); Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U. S. 158, 166 (1944), and I think I am safe in saying that no one doubts the wisdom or validity of those decisions. Where the interest under consideration is a parent-child relationship, we need not ask, over and over again, whether that interest is one that society traditionally protects.

Thus, to describe the issue in this case as whether the relationship existing between Michael and Victoria “has been treated as a protected family unit under the historic practices of our society, or whether on any other basis it has been accorded special protection,” ante, at 124, is to reinvent the wheel. The better approach — indeed, the one commanded by our prior cases and by common sense — is to ask whether the specific parent-child relationship under consideration is close enough to the interests that we already have protected to be deemed an aspect of “liberty” as well. On the facts before us, therefore, the question is not what “level of generality” should be used to describe the relationship between Michael and Victoria, see ante, at 127, n. 6, but whether the relationship under consideration is sufficiently substantial to qualify as a liberty interest under our prior cases.

On four prior occasions, we have considered whether unwed fathers have a constitutionally protected interest in their relationships with their children. See Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972); Quilloin v. Walcott, 434 U. S. 246 (1978); Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 (1979); and Lehr v. Robertson, 463 U. S. 248 (1983). Though different in factual and legal circumstances, these cases have produced a unifying theme: although an unwed father’s biological link to his child does not, in and of itself, guarantee him a constitutional stake in his relationship with that child, such a link combined with a substantial parent-child relationship will do *143so.2 “When an unwed father demonstrates a full commitment to the responsibilities of parenthood by ‘com[ing] forward to participate in the rearing of his child,’... his interest in personal contact with his child acquires substantial protection under the Due Process Clause. At that point it may be said that he ‘act[s] as a father toward his children.’” Lehr v. Robertson, supra, at 261, quoting Caban v. Mohammed, supra, at 392, 389, n. 7. This commitment is why Mr. Stanley and Mr. Caban won; why Mr. Quilloin and Mr. Lehr lost; and why Michael H. should prevail today. Michael H. is almost certainly Victoria D.’s natural father, has lived with her as her father, has contributed to her support, and has from the beginning sought to strengthen and maintain his relationship with her.

Claiming that the intent of these cases was to protect the “unitary family,” ante, at 123, the plurality waves Stanley, Quilloin, Caban, and Lehr aside. In evaluating the plurality’s dismissal of these precedents, it is essential to identify its conception of the “unitary family.” If, by acknowledging that Stanley et al. sought to protect “the relationships that develop within the unitary family,” ibid., the plurality meant only to describe the kinds of relationships that develop when parents and children live together (formally or informally) as a family, then the plurality’s vision of these cases would be correct. But that is not the plurality’s message. Though it pays lipservice to the idea that marriage is not the crucial fact in denying constitutional protection to the relationship between Michael and Victoria, ante, at 123, n. 3, the plurality cannot mean what it says.

The evidence is undisputed that Michael, Victoria, and Carole did live together as a family; that is, they shared the *144same household, Victoria called Michael “Daddy,” Michael contributed to Victoria’s support, and he is eager to continue his relationship with her. Yet they are not, in the plurality’s view, a “unitary family,” whereas Gerald, Carole, and Victoria do compose such a family. The only difference between these two sets of relationships, however, is the fact of marriage. The plurality, indeed, expressly recognizes that marriage is the critical fact in denying Michael a constitutionally protected stake in his relationship with Victoria: no fewer than six times, the plurality refers to Michael as the “adulterous natural father” (emphasis added) or the like. Ante, at 120; 127, n. 6; 128, n. 6; 129, n. 7; 130. See also ante, at 124 (referring to the “marital family” of Gerald, Carole, and Victoria) (emphasis added); ante, at 129 (plurality’s holding limited to those situations in which there is “an extant marital family”).3 However, the very premise of Stanley and the cases following it is that marriage is not decisive in answering the question whether the Constitution protects the parental relationship under consideration. These cases are, after all, important precisely because they involve the rights of unwed fathers. It is important to remember, moreover, that in Quilloin, Caban, and Lehr, the putative father’s demands would have disrupted a “unitary family” as the plurality defines it; in each case, the husband of the child’s mother sought to adopt the child over the objections of the natural father. Significantly, our decisions in those cases in no way relied on the need to protect the marital family. Hence the plurality’s claim that Stanley, Quilloin, Caban, and Lehr *145were about the “unitary family,” as that family is defined by today’s plurality, is surprising indeed.

The plurality’s exclusive rather than inclusive definition of the “unitary family” is out of step with other decisions as well. This pinched conception of “the family,” crucial as it is in rejecting Michael’s and Victoria’s claims of a liberty interest, is jarring in light of our many cases preventing the States from denying important interests or statuses to those whose situations do not fit the government’s narrow view of the family. From Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1 (1967), to Levy v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 68 (1968), and Glona v. American Guarantee & Liability Ins. Co., 391 U. S. 73 (1968), and from Gomez v. Perez, 409 U. S. 535 (1973), to Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494 (1977), we have declined to respect a State’s notion, as manifested in its allocation of privileges and burdens, of what the family should be. Today’s rhapsody on the “unitary family” is out of tune with such decisions.

The plurality’s focus on the “unitary family” is misdirected for another reason. It conflates the question whether a liberty interest exists with the question what procedures may be used to terminate or curtail it. It is no coincidence that we never before have looked at the relationship that the unwed father seeks to disrupt, rather than the one he seeks to preserve, in determining whether he has a liberty interest in his relationship with his child. To do otherwise is to allow the State’s interest in terminating the relationship to play a role in defining the “liberty” that is protected by the Constitution. According to our established framework under the Due Process Clause, however, we first ask whether the person claiming constitutional protection has an interest that the Constitution recognizes; if we find that he or she does, we next consider the State’s interest in limiting the extent of the procedures that will attend the deprivation of that interest. See, e. g., Logan v. Zimmerman Brush Co., 455 U. S. 422, 428 (1982). By stressing the need to preserve the “unitary *146family” and by focusing not just on the relationship between Michael and Victoria but on their “situation” as well, ante, at 124, today’s plurality opinion takes both of these steps at once.

The plurality’s premature consideration of California’s interests is evident from its careful limitation of its holding to those cases in which “the mother is, at the time of the child’s conception and birth, married to, and cohabitating with, another man, both of whom wish to raise the child as the offspring of their union.” Ante, at 129 (emphasis added). See also ante, at 127 (describing Michael’s liberty interest as the “substantive parental rights [of] the natural father of a child conceived within, and born into, an extant marital union that wishes to embrace the child”). The highlighted language suggests that if Carole or Gerald alone wished to raise Victoria, or if both were dead and the State wished to raise her, Michael and Victoria might be found to have a liberty interest in their relationship with each other.4 But that would be to say that whether Michael and Victoria have a liberty interest varies with the State’s interest in recognizing that interest, for it is the State’s interest in protecting the marital family— and not Michael and Victoria’s interest in their relationship with each other — that varies with the status of Carole and Gerald’s relationship. It is a bad day for due process when *147the State’s interest in terminating a parent-child relationship is reason to conclude that that relationship is not part of the “liberty” protected by the Fourteenth Amendment.

The plurality has wedged itself between a rock and a hard place. If it limits its holding to those situations in which a wife and husband wish to raise the child together, then it necessarily takes the State’s interest into account in defining “liberty”; yet if it extends that approach to circumstances in which the marital union already has been dissolved, then it may no longer rely on the State’s asserted interest in protecting the “unitary family” in denying that Michael and Victoria have been deprived of liberty.

The plurality’s confusion about the proper analysis of claims involving procedural due process also becomes obvious when one examines the plurality’s shift in emphasis from the putative father’s standing to his ability to obtain parental prerogatives. See ante, at 126. In announcing that what matters is not the father’s ability to claim paternity, but his ability to obtain “substantive parental rights,” ante, at 127, the plurality turns procedural due process upside down. Michael’s challenge in this Court does not depend on his ability ultimately to obtain visitation rights; it would be strange indeed if, before one could be granted a hearing, one were required to prove that one would prevail on the merits. The point of procedural due process is to give the litigant a fair chance at prevailing, not to ensure a particular substantive outcome. Nor does Michael’s challenge depend on the success of fathers like him in obtaining parental rights in past cases; procedural due process is, by and large, an individual guarantee, not one that should depend on the success or failure of prior cases having little or nothing to do with the claimant’s own suit.5

*1481 — (

Because the plurality decides that Michael and Victoria have no liberty interest in their relationship with each other, it need consider neither the effect of § 621 on their relationship nor the State’s interest in bringing about that effect. It is obvious, however, that the effect of § 621 is to terminate the relationship between Michael and Victoria before affording any hearing whatsoever on the issue whether Michael is Victoria’s father. This refusal to hold a hearing is properly analyzed under our procedural due process cases, which instruct us to consider the State’s interest in curtailing the procedures accompanying the termination of a constitutionally protected interest. California’s interest, minute in comparison with a father’s interest in his relationship with his child, cannot justify its refusal to hear Michael out on his claim that he is Victoria’s father.

A

We must first understand the nature of the challenged statute: it is a law that stubbornly insists that Gerald is Victoria’s father, in the face of evidence showing a 98 percent probability that her father is Michael.6 What Michael wants is a chance to show that he is Victoria’s father. By depriving him of this opportunity, California prevents Michael from taking advantage of the best-interest standard embodied in § 4601 of California’s Civil Code, which directs that parents be given visitation rights unless “the visitation would be detrimental to the best interests of the child.” Cal. Civ. Code Ann. §4601 (West Supp. 1989).7

*149As interpreted by the California courts, however, § 621 not only deprives Michael of the benefits of the best-interest standard; it also deprives him of any chance of maintaining his relationship with the child he claims to be his own. When, as a result of § 621, a putative father may not establish his paternity, neither may he obtain discretionary visitation rights as a “nonparent” under § 4601. See Vincent B. v. Joan R., 126 Cal. App. 3d 619, 627-628, 179 Cal. Rptr. 9, 13 (1981), appeal dism’d, 459 U. S. 807 (1982); see also ante, at 116. Justice Stevens’ assertion to the contrary, ante, at 134-135, is mere wishful thinking. In concluding that the California courts afford putative fathers like Michael a meaningful opportunity to show that visitation rights would be in the best interests of their children, he fastens upon the words “in the circumstances of this case” in Vincent B. v. Joan R., supra, at 627, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 13. Ante, at 134-135. His suggestion is that the court in that case conducted an individualized assessment of the effect on the child of granting visitation rights to Vincent B.

*150The California appellate court’s decision will not support Justice Stevens’ reading, as the court’s reasoning applies to all putative fathers whom § 621 has denied the opportunity to show paternity. The court in Vincent B. began by stressing the fact that the child’s mother objected to visits from Vincent. This circumstance is present in every single case falling under the conclusive presumption of § 621. Granting visitation rights to a person who claimed to be the child’s father, the court went on, also would cause “confusion, uncertainty, and embarrassment.” 126 Cal. App. 3d, at 628, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 13. Again, the notion that unacceptable confusion would result from awarding visitation to a person who claims to be the child’s father is equally applicable to any case in which the “nonparent” under §4601 has lost under §621. Finally, the court in Vincent B. approvingly cited Petitioner F. v. Respondent R., 430 A. 2d 1076, 1080 (1981), in which the Supreme Court of Delaware rejected a putative father’s argument that Delaware’s conclusive presumption of paternity violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Federal Constitution. 126 Cal. App. 3d, at 627, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 13. Emphasizing the “permanent stigma and distress” that would result from granting parental rights to a putative father whose child was born to the wife of another man, the Delaware court decided that, given the State’s interest in “guarding] against assaults upon the family unit[,] . . . [t]he application of the presumption of legitimacy of a child born to a married woman would be in the child’s interest in practically all cases.” 430 A. 2d, at 1080 (emphasis added). Vincent S.’s reliance on Petitioner F. sends a clear signal that the California court was issuing a ruling applicable to any case that fit into §621’s conclusive presumption, and that the “rough justice” that prevailed under § 621 also would suffice under §4601. This kind of determination is a far cry from the individualized assessment that Justice Stevens would seem to demand. Ante, at 135.8

*151Likewise, in the case before us, the court’s finding that “the existence of two (2) ‘fathers’ as male authority figures will confuse the child and be counter-productive to her best interests,” Supp. App. to Juris. Statement A-90 — A-91, is not an evaluation of the relationship between Michael and Victoria, but a restatement of the policies underlying § 621 itself. It may well be that the California courts’ interpretation of § 4601 as precluding visitation rights for a putative father is “an unnatural reading” of that provision, ante, at 134, but it is not for us to decide what California’s statute means.

Section 621 as construed by the California courts thus cuts off the relationship between Michael and Victoria — a liberty interest protected by the Due Process Clause — without affording the least bit of process. This case, in other words, involves a conclusive presumption that is used to terminate a constitutionally protected interest — the kind of rule that our preoccupation with procedural fairness has caused us to condemn. See, e. g., Vlandis v. Kline, 412 U. S. 441 (1973); Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur, 414 U. S. 632 (1974); Weinberger v. Salfi, 422 U. S. 749, 770-772 (1975).

Gerald D. and the plurality turn a blind eye to the true nature of § 621 by protesting that, instead of being a conclusive presumption, it is a “substantive rule of law.” Ante, at 119. This facile observation cannot save § 621. It may be that all conclusive presumptions are, in a sense, substantive rules of law; but § 621 then belongs in that special category of substantive rules that presumes a fact relevant to a certain class of litigation, and it is that feature that renders § 621 suspect under our prior cases. To put the point differently, a conclusive presumption takes the form of “no X’s are Y’s,” and is typically accompanied by a rule such as, “. . . and only Y’s may obtain a driver’s license.” (There would be no need for the presumption unless something hinged on the fact pre*152sumed.) Ignoring the fact that §621 takes the form of “no X’s are Y’s,” Gerald D. and the plurality fix upon the rule following §621 — only Y’s may assert parental rights — and call § 621 a substantive rule of law. This strategy ignores both the form and the effect of § 621.

In a further effort to show that § 621 is not a conclusive presumption, Gerald D. claims — and the plurality agrees, see ante, at 119 — that whether a man is the biological father of a child whose family situation places the putative father within § 621 is simply irrelevant to the State. Brief for Appellee 14. This is, I surmise, an attempt to avoid the implications of our cases condemning the presumption of a fact that a State has made relevant or decisive to a particular decision. See, e. g., Bell v. Burson, 402 U. S. 535 (1971). Yet the claim that California does not care about factual paternity is patently false. California cares very much about factual paternity when the husband is impotent or sterile, see Cal. Evid. Code Ann. § 621(a) (West Supp. 1989); it cares very much about it when the wife and husband do not share the same home, see Vincent B. v. Joan R., 126 Cal. App. 3d, at 623-624, 179 Cal. Rptr., at 11; and it cares very much about it when the husband himself declares that he is not the father, see Cal. Evid. Code Ann. § 621(c) (West Supp. 1989). Indeed, under California law as currently structured, paternity is decisive in choosing the standard that will be used in granting or denying custody or visitation. The State, though selective in its concern for factual paternity, certainly is not indifferent to it.9 More fundamentally, California’s purported indifference to factual paternity does not show that § 621 is not a conclu*153sive presumption. To say that California does not care about factual paternity in the limited circumstances of this case — where the husband is neither impotent nor sterile nor living apart from his wife — is simply another way of describing its conclusive presumption.

Not content to rest on its assertion that §621 does not, in fact, establish a conclusive presumption, the plurality goes on to argue that a challenge to a conclusive presumption must rest on substantive rather than procedural due process. See ante, at 120-121. This is simply not so. In Weinberger v. Salfi, supra, the Court identified two lines of cases involving challenges to social-welfare legislation: those in which a legislative classification was challenged as arbitrary and those in which a conclusive presumption was attacked. The Court fit the complaint in Salfi into the former category on the ground that the challenged law did not deprive anyone of a constitutionally protected interest. 422 U. S., at 772. Today’s plurality, in contrast, classifies this case as one invoking substantive due process before it considers the nature of the interest at stake. Its support for this innovation includes several law-review commentaries, two concurrences in the judgment, a dissent, and Salfi itself. Ante, at 120-121. Even more disturbing than the plurality’s reliance on these infirm foundations is its failure to recognize that the defect from which conclusive presumptions suffer is a procedural one: the State has declared a certain fact relevant, indeed controlling, yet has denied a particular class of litigants a hearing to establish that fact. This is precisely the kind of flaw that procedural due process is designed to correct.10

*154B

The question before us, therefore, is whether California has an interest so powerful that it justifies granting Michael no hearing before terminating his parental rights.

“Many controversies have raged about the cryptic and abstract words of the Due Process Clause but there can be no doubt that at a minimum they require that deprivation of life, liberty or property by adjudication be preceded by notice and opportunity for hearing appropriate to the nature of the case.” Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U. S. 306, 313 (1950). When a State seeks to limit the procedures that will attend the deprivation of a constitutionally protected interest, it is only the State’s interest in streamlining procedures that is relevant. See, e. g., Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U. S. 319, 335 (1976). A State may not, in other words, justify abbreviated procedures on the ground that it wishes to pay welfare benefits to fewer people or wants to reduce the number of tenured professors on its payroll. It would be strange indeed if a State could curtail procedures with the explanation that it was hostile to the underlying, constitutionally protected interest.

The purported state interests here, however, stem primarily from the State’s antagonism to Michael’s and Victoria’s constitutionally protected interest in their relationship with each other and not from any desire to streamline procedures. Gerald D. explains that § 621 promotes marriage, maintains the relationship between the child and presumed father, and protects the integrity and privacy of the matrimonial family. Brief for Appellee 24. It is not, however, §621, but the best-interest principle, that protects a stable marital relationship and maintains the relationship between the child and presumed father. These interests are implicated by the determination of who gets parental rights, not by the determination of who is the father; in the hearing that Michael seeks, parental rights are not the issue. Of the objectives that Gerald stresses, therefore, only the preservation of fam*155ily privacy is promoted by the refusal to hold a hearing itself. Yet §621 furthers even this objective only partially.

Gerald D. gives generous proportions to the privacy protected by § 621, asserting that this provision protects a couple like Gerald and Carole from answering questions on such matters as “their sexual habits and practices with each other and outside their marriage, their finances, and their thoughts, beliefs, and opinions concerning their relationship with each other and with Victoria.” Id., at 25. Yet invalidation of § 621 would not, as Gerald suggests, subject Gerald and Carole to public scrutiny of all of these private matters. Family finances and family dynamics are relevant, not to paternity, but to the best interests of the child — and the child’s best interests are not, as I have stressed, in issue at the hearing that Michael seeks. The only private matter touching on the paternity presumed by § 621 is the married couple’s sex life. Even there, § 621 as interpreted by California’s intermediate appellate courts pre-empts inquiry into a couple’s sexual relations, since “cohabitation” consists simply of living under the same roof together; the wife and husband need not even share the same bed. See, e. g., Vincent B. v. Joan R., 126 Cal. App. 3d 619, 179 Cal. Rptr. 9 (1981). Admittedly, §621 does not foreclose inquiry into the husband’s fertility or virility — matters that are ordinarily thought of as the couple’s private business. In this day and age, however, proving paternity by asking intimate and detailed questions about a couple’s relationship would be decidedly anachronistic. Who on earth would choose this method of establishing fatherhood when blood tests prove it with far more certainty and far less fuss? The State’s purported interest in protecting matrimonial privacy thus does not measure up to Michael’s and Victoria’s interest in maintaining their relationship with each other.11

*156Make no mistake: to say that the State must provide Michael with a hearing to prove his paternity is not to express any opinion of the ultimate state of affairs between Michael and Victoria and Carole and Gerald. In order to change the current situation among these people, Michael first must convince a court that he is Victoria’s father, and even if he is able to do this, he will be denied visitation rights if that would be in Victoria’s best interests. See Cal. Civ. Code Ann. § 4601 (West Supp. 1989). It is elementary that a determination that a State must afford procedures before it terminates a given right is not a prediction about the end result of those procedures.12

IV

The atmosphere surrounding today’s decision is one of make-believe. Beginning with the suggestion that the situa*157tion confronting us here does not repeat itself every day in every corner of the country, ante, at 113, moving on to the claim that it is tradition alone that supplies the details of the liberty that the Constitution protects, and passing finally to the notion that the Court always has recognized a cramped vision of “the family,” today’s decision lets stand California’s pronouncement that Michael—whom blood tests show to a 98 percent probability to be Victoria’s father—is not Victoria’s father. When and if the Court awakes to reality, it will find a world very different from the one it expects.

Justice White,

with whom Justice Brennan joins,

dissenting.

California law, as the plurality describes it, ante, at 119, tells us that, except in limited circumstances, California declares it to be “irrelevant for paternity purposes whether a child conceived during, and born into, an existing marriage was begotten by someone other than the husband” (emphasis in original). This I do not accept, for the fact that Michael H. is the biological father of Victoria is to me highly relevant to whether he has rights, as a father or otherwise, with respect to the child. Because I believe that Michael H. has a liberty interest that cannot be denied without due process of the law, I must dissent.

I

Like Justices Brennan, Marshall, Blackmun, and Stevens, I do not agree with the plurality opinion’s conclusion that a natural father can never “have a constitutionally protected interest in his relationship with a child whose mother was married to, and cohabiting with, another man at the time of the child’s conception and birth.” Ante, at 133 (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment). Prior cases here have recognized the liberty interest of a father in his relationship with his child. In none of these cases did we indicate that the father’s rights were dependent on the marital status nf I-Lo mntLav m» Hinlncnníil fitfhav TVip hnsir> nrinpi'nlp prmn-*158ciated in the Court’s unwed father cases is that an unwed father who has demonstrated a sufficient commitment to his paternity by way of personal, financial, or custodial responsibilities has a protected liberty interest in a relationship with his child.1

We have not before faced the question of a biological father’s relationship with his child when the child was born while the mother was married to another man. On several occasions however, we have considered whether a biological father has a constitutionally cognizable interest in an opportunity to establish paternity. Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U. S. 645 (1972), recognized the biological father’s right to a legal relationship with his illegitimate child, holding that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment entitled the biological father to a hearing on his fitness before his illegitimate children could be removed from his custody. We rejected the State’s treatment of Stanley “not as a parent but as a stranger to his children.” Id., at 648.

Quilloin v. Walcott, 434 U. S. 246, 255 (1978), also expressly recognized due process rights ill the biological father, even while holding that those rights were not impermissibly burdened by the State’s application of a “best interests of the child” standard. Caban v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380 *159(1979), invalidated on equal protection grounds a statute under which a man’s children could be adopted by their natural mother and her husband without the natural father’s consent.

In Lehr v. Robertson, 463 U. S. 248, 261-262 (1983), though holding against the father in that case, the Court said clearly that fathers who have participated in raising their illegitimate children and have developed a relationship with them have constitutionally protected parental rights. Indeed, the Court in Lehr suggested that States must provide a biological father of an illegitimate child the means by which he may establish his paternity so that he may have the opportunity to develop a relationship with his child. The Court upheld a stepparent adoption over the natural father’s objections, but acknowledged that “the existence or nonexistence of a substantial relationship between parent and child is a relevant criterion in evaluating both the rights of the parent and the best interests of the child.” Id,., at 266-267. There, however, the father had never established a custodial, personal, or financial relationship with his child. Lehr had never lived with the child or the child’s mother after the birth of the child and had never provided any financial support.

In the case now before us, Michael H. is not a father unwilling to assume his responsibilities as a parent. To the contrary, he is a father who has asserted his interests in raising and providing for his child since the very time of the child’s birth. In contrast to the father in Lehr, Michael had begun to develop a relationship with his daughter. There is no dispute on this point. Michael contributed to the child’s support. Michael and Victoria lived together (albeit intermittently, given Carole’s itinerant lifestyle). There is a personal and emotional relationship between Michael and Victoria, who grew up calling him “Daddy.” Michael held Victoria out as his daughter and contributed to the child’s financial support. (Even appellee concedes that Michael has “made greater efforts and had more success in establishing a *160father-child relationship” than did Mr. Lehr. Brief for Ap-pellee 13, n. 6.) The mother has never denied, and indeed has admitted, that Michael is Victoria’s father.2 Lehr was predicated on the absence of a substantial relationship between the man and the child and emphasized the “difference between the developed parent-child relationship that was implicated in Stanley and Caban, and the potential relationship involved in Quilloin and [Lehr].” Lehr, supra, at 261. “When an unwed father demonstrates a full commitment to the responsibilities of parenthood by ‘com[ing] forward to participate in the rearing of his child,’ Caban, supra, at 392, his interest in personal contact with his child acquires substantial protection under the Due Process Clause. ” Lehr, supra, at 261. The facts in this case satisfy the Lehr criteria, which focused on the relationship between father and child, not on the relationship between father and mother. Under Lehr a “mere biological relationship” is not enough, but in light of Carole’s vicissitudes, what more could Michael have done? It is clear enough that Michael more than meets the mark in establishing the constitutionally protected liberty interest discussed in Lehr and recognized in Stanley v. Illinois, supra, and Caban v. Mohammed, supra. He therefore has a liberty interest entitled to protection under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

II

California plainly denies Michael this protection, by refusing him the opportunity to rebut the State’s presumption that the mother’s husband is the father of the child. California law not only deprives Michael of a legal parent-child relationship with his daughter Victoria but even denies him the opportunity to introduce blood-test evidence to rebut the de*161monstrable fiction that Gerald is Victoria’s father.3 Unlike Lehr, Michael has not been denied notice. He has, most definitely, however, been denied any real opportunity to be heard. The grant of summary judgment against Michael was based on the conclusive presumption of Cal. Evid. Code Ann. § 621 (West Supp. 1989), which denied him the opportunity to prove that he is Victoria’s biological father. The Court gives its blessing to §621 by relying on the State’s asserted interests in the integrity of the family (defined as Carole and Gerald) and in protecting Victoria from the stigma of illegitimacy and by balancing away Michael’s interest in establishing that he is the father of the child.

The interest in protecting a child from the social stigma of illegitimacy lacks any real connection to the facts of a case where a father is seeking to establish, rather than repudiate, paternity. The “stigma of illegitimacy” argument harks back to ancient common law when there were no blood tests to ascertain that the husband could not “by the laws of nature” be the child’s father. Judicial process refused to declare that a child born in wedlock was illegitimate unless the proof was positive. The only such proof was physical absence or impotency. But we have now clearly recognized the use of blood tests as an authoritative means of evaluating allegations of paternity. See, e. g., Little v. Streater, 452 U. S. 1, 6-7 (1981). I see no reason to debate the plurality’s multilingual explorations into “spousal nonaccess” and ancient policy concerns behind bastardy laws. It may be true that a child conceived in an extramarital relationship would *162be considered a “bastard” in the literal sense of the word, but whatever stigma remains in today’s society is far less compelling in the context of a child of a married mother, especially when there is a father asserting paternity and seeking a relationship with his child. It is hardly rare in this world of divorce and remarriage for a child to live with the “father” to whom her mother is married, and still have a relationship with her biological father.

The State’s professed interest in the preservation of the existing marital unit is a more significant concern. To be sure, the intrusion of an outsider asserting that he is the father of a child whom the husband believes to be his own would be disruptive to say the least. On the facts of this case, however, Gerald was well aware of the liaison between Carole and Michael. The conclusive presumption of eviden-tiary rule §621 virtually eliminates the putative father’s chances of succeeding in his effort to establish paternity, but it by no means prevents him from asserting the claim. It may serve as a deterrent to such claims but does not eliminate the threat. Further, the argument that the conclusive presumption preserved the sanctity of the marital unit had more sway in a time when the husband was similarly prevented from challenging paternity.4

*163“The emphasis of the Due Process Clause is on ‘process.’” Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494, 542 (1977) (White, J., dissenting). I fail to see the fairness in the process established by the State of California and endorsed by the Court today. Michael has evidence which demonstrates that he is the father of young Victoria. Yet he is blocked by the State from presenting that evidence to a court. As a result, he is foreclosed from establishing his paternity and is ultimately precluded, by the State, from developing a relationship with his child. “A fundamental requirement of due process is ‘the opportunity to be heard.’ Grannis v. Ordean, 234 U. S. 385, 394. It is an opportunity which must be granted at a meaningful time and in a meaningful manner.” Armstrong v. Manzo, 380 U. S. 545, 552 (1965). I fail to see how Michael was granted any meaningful opportunity to be heard when he was precluded at the very outset from introducing evidence which would support his assertion of paternity. Michael has never been afforded an opportunity to present his case in any meaningful manner.

As the Court has said: “The significance of the biological connection is that it offers the natural father an opportunity that no other male possesses to develop a relationship with his offspring. If he grasps that opportunity and accepts some measure of responsibility for the child’s future, he may enjoy the blessings of the parent-child relationship and make uniquely valuable contributions to the child’s development.” Lehr, 463 U. S., at 262. It is as if this passage was addressed to Michael. Yet the plurality today recants. Michael eagerly grasped the opportunity to have a relationship with his daughter (he lived with her; he declared her to be his child; he provided financial support for her) and still, with today’s opinion, his opportunity has vanished. He has been rendered a stranger to his child.

Because Cal. Evid. Code Ann. § 621, as applied, should be held unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, I respectfully dissent.

*87Opinion

PANELLI, J.

In this case we address several of the legal questions raised by recent advances in reproductive technology. When, pursuant to a surrogacy agreement, a zygote1 formed of the gametes2 of a husband and wife is implanted in the uterus of another woman, who carries the resulting fetus to term and gives birth to a child not genetically related to her, who is the child’s “natural mother” under California law? Does a determination that the wife is the child’s natural mother work a deprivation of the gestating woman’s constitutional rights? And is such an agreement barred by any public policy of this state?

We conclude that the husband and wife are the child’s natural parents, and that this result does not offend the state or federal Constitution or public policy.

Facts3

Mark and Crispina Calvert are a married couple who desired to have a child. Crispina was forced to undergo a hysterectomy in 1984. Her ovaries remained capable of producing eggs, however, and the couple eventually considered surrogacy. In 1989 Anna Johnson heard about Crispina’s plight from a coworker and offered to serve as a surrogate for the Calverts.

On January 15, 1990, Mark, Crispina, and Anna signed a contract providing that an embryo created by the sperm of Mark and the egg of Crispina would be implanted in Anna and the child bom would be taken into Mark and Crispina’s home “as their child.” Anna agreed she would relinquish “all parental rights” to the child in favor of Mark and Crispina. In return, Mark and Crispina would pay Anna $10,000 in a series of installments, the last to be paid six weeks after the child’s birth. Mark and Crispina were also to pay for a $200,000 life insurance policy on Anna’s life.4

The zygote was implanted on January 19, 1990. Less than a month later, an ultrasound test confirmed Anna was pregnant.

Unfortunately, relations deteriorated between the two sides. Mark learned that Anna had not disclosed she had suffered several stillbirths and miscarriages. Anna felt Mark and Crispina did not do enough to obtain the required *88insurance policy. She also felt abandoned during an onset of premature labor in June.

In July 1990, Anna sent Mark and Crispina a letter demanding the balance of the payments due her or else she would refuse to give up the child. The following month, Mark and Crispina responded with a lawsuit, seeking a declaration they were the legal parents of the unborn child. Anna filed her own action to be declared the mother of the child, and the two cases were eventually consolidated. The parties agreed to an independent guardian ad litem for the purposes of the suit.

The child was born on September 19, 1990, and blood samples were obtained from both Anna and the child for analysis. The blood test results excluded Anna as the genetic mother. The parties agreed to a court order providing that the child would remain with Mark and Crispina on a temporary basis with visits by Anna.

At trial in October 1990, the parties stipulated that Mark and Crispina were the child’s genetic parents. After hearing evidence and arguments, the trial court ruled that Mark and Crispina were the child’s “genetic, biological and natural” father and mother, that Anna had no “parental” rights to the child, and that the surrogacy contract was legal and enforceable against Anna’s claims. The court also terminated the order allowing visitation. Anna appealed from the trial court’s judgment. The Court of Appeal for the Fourth District, Division Three, affirmed. We granted review.

Discussion

Determining Maternity Under the Uniform Parentage Act

The Uniform Parentage Act (the Act) was part of a package of legislation introduced in 1975 as Senate Bill No. 347. Tfte legislation’s purpose was to eliminate the legal distinction between legitimate and illegitimate children. The Act followed in the wake of certain United States Supreme Court decisions mandating equal treatment of legitimate and illegitimate children. (See, e.g., Levy v. Louisiana (1968) 391 U.S. 68 [20 L.Ed.2d 436, 88 S.Ct. 1509] [state could not deny illegitimate child right to bring tort action for wrongful death of parent if it gave legitimate child the same right]; Glona v. American Guarantee Co. (1968) 391 U.S. 73 [20 L.Ed.2d 441, 88 S.Ct. 1515] [state could not deny parent of illegitimate child right to bring tort action for wrongful death of child if it gave parent of legitimate child the same right].) A press release issued on October 2, 1975, described Senate Bill No. 347 this way: “The bill, as amended, would revise or repeal various laws which *89now provide for labeling children as legitimate or illegitimate and defining their legal rights and those of their parents accordingly. In place of these cruel and outmoded provisions, SB 347 would enact the Uniform Parentage Act which bases parent and child rights on the existence of a parent and child relationship rather than on the marital status of the parents.”

The pertinent portion of Senate Bill No. 347, which passed with negligible opposition, became part 7 of division 4 of the California Civil Code, sections 7000-7021.5

Civil Code sections 7001 and 7002 replace the distinction between legitimate and illegitimate children with the concept of the “parent and child relationship.” The “parent and child relationship" means “the legal relationship existing between a child and his natural or adoptive parents incident to which the law confers or imposes rights, privileges, duties, and obligations. It includes the mother and child relationship and the father and child relationship.” (Civ. Code, § 7001.) “The parent and child relationship extends equally to every child and to every parent, regardless of the marital status of the parents.” (Civ. Code, § 7002.) The “parent and child relationship” is thus a legal relationship encompassing two kinds of parents, “natural” and “adoptive.”

Passage of the Act clearly was not motivated by the need to resolve surrogacy disputes, which were virtually unknown in 1975. Yet it facially applies to any parentage determination, including the rare case in which a child’s maternity is in issue. We are invited to disregard the Act and decide this case according to other criteria, including constitutional precepts and our sense of the demands of public policy. We feel constrained, however, to decline the invitation. Not uncommonly, courts must construe statutes in factual settings not contemplated by the enacting legislature. For example, in People v. Salemme (1992) 2 Cal.App.4th 775 [3 Cal.Rptr.2d 398], the court upheld a conviction of burglary when the felony the defendant entered the residence to commit was that of the fraudulent sale of securities. This scenario likely was not within the Legislature’s contemplation when it enacted Penal Code section 459. Nonetheless, the burglary statute, on its face, addressed the defendant’s conduct and was properly interpreted to apply to it. Similarly, the Act offers a mechanism to resolve this dispute, albeit one not specifically tooled for it. We therefore proceed to analyze the parties’ contentions within the Act’s framework.

These contentions are readily summarized. Anna, of course, predicates her claim of maternity on the fact that she gave birth to the child. The *90Calverts contend that Crispina’s genetic relationship to the child establishes that she is his mother. Counsel for the minor joins in that contention and argues, in addition, that several of the presumptions created by the Act dictate the same result. As will appear, we conclude that presentation of blood test evidence is one means of establishing maternity, as is proof of having given birth, but that the presumptions cited by minor’s counsel do not apply to this case.

We turn to those few provisions of the Act directly addressing the determination of maternity. “Any interested party,” presumably including a genetic mother, “may bring an action to determine the existence ... of a mother and child relationship.” (Civ. Code, § 7015.) Civil Code section 7003 provides, in relevant part, that between a child and the natural mother a parent and child relationship “may be established by proof of her having given birth to the child, or under [the Act].” (Civ. Code, § 7003, subd. (1), italics added.) Apart from Civil Code section 7003, the Act sets forth no specific means by which a natural mother can establish a parent and child relationship. However, it declares that, insofar as practicable, provisions applicable to the father and child relationship apply in an action to determine the existence or nonexistence of a mother and child relationship. (Civ. Code, § 7015.) Thus, it is appropriate to examine those provisions as well.

A man can establish a father and child relationship by the means set forth in Civil Code section 7004. (Civ. Code, §§ 7006, 7004.) Paternity is presumed under that section if the man meets the conditions set forth in section 621 of the Evidence Code. (Civ. Code, § 7004, subd. (a).) The latter statute applies, by its terms, when determining the questioned paternity of a child bom to a married woman, and contemplates reliance on evidence derived from blood testing. (Evid. Code, § 621, subds. (a), (b);6 see Evid. Code, §§ 890-897 [Uniform Act on Blood Tests to Determine Paternity].) Alternatively, Civil Code section 7004 creates a presumption of paternity based on the man’s conduct toward the child (e.g., receiving the child into his home *91and openly holding the child out as his natural child) or his marriage or attempted marriage to the child’s natural mother under specified conditions.7

In our view, the presumptions contained in Civil Code section 7004 do not apply here. They describe situations in which substantial evidence points to a particular man as the natural father of the child. (9B West’s U.Laws Ann. (1987) Unif. Parentage Act, com. foll. § 4, p. 299.) In this case, there is no question as to who is claiming the mother and child relationship, and the factual basis of each woman’s claim is obvious. Thus, there is no need to resort to an evidentiary presumption to ascertain the identity of the natural mother. Instead, we must make the purely legal determination as between the two claimants.

Significantly for this case, Evidence Code section 892 provides that blood testing may be ordered in an action when paternity is a relevant fact. When maternity is disputed, genetic evidence derived from blood testing is likewise admissible. (Evid. Code, § 892; see Civ. Code, § 7015.) The Evidence Code further provides that if the court finds the conclusions of all the experts, as disclosed by the evidence based on the *92blood tests, are that the alleged father is not the father of the child, the question of paternity is resolved accordingly. (Evid. Code, § 895.) By parity of reasoning, blood testing may also be dispositive of the question of maternity. Further, there is a rebuttable presumption of paternity (hence, maternity as well) on the finding of a certain number of genetic markers. (Evid. Code, § 895.5.)

Disregarding the presumptions of paternity that have no application to this case, then, we are left with the undisputed evidence that Anna, not Crispina, gave birth to the child and that Crispina, not Anna, is genetically related to him. Both women thus have adduced evidence of a mother and child relationship as contemplated by the Act. (Civ. Code, §§ 7003, subd. (1), 7004, subd. (a), 7015; Evid. Code, §§ 621, 892.) Yet for any child California law recognizes only one natural mother, despite advances in reproductive technology rendering a different outcome biologically possible.8

We see no clear legislative preference in Civil Code section 7003 as between blood testing evidence and proof of having given birth.9 “May” indicates that proof of having given birth is a permitted method of establishing a mother and child relationship, although perhaps not the exclusive one. The disjunctive “or” indicates that blood test evidence, as prescribed in the Act, constitutes an alternative to proof of having given birth. It may be that the language of the Act merely reflects “the ancient dictum mater est quam [,gestatio] demonstrat (by gestation the mother is demonstrated). This phrase, by its use of the word ‘demonstrated,’ has always reflected an ambiguity in the meaning of the presumption. It is arguable that, while gestation may demonstrate maternal status, it is not the sine qua non of motherhood. Rather, it is possible that the common law viewed genetic consanguinity as the basis for maternal rights. Under this latter interpretation, gestation *93simply would be irrefutable evidence of the more fundamental genetic relationship.” (Hill, What Does It Mean to Be a “Parent”? The Claims of Biology as the Basis for Parental Rights (1991) 66 N.Y.U. L.Rev. 353, 370, fns. omitted.) This ambiguity, highlighted by the problems arising from the use of artificial reproductive techniques, is nowhere explicitly resolved in the Act.

Because two women each have presented acceptable proof of maternity, we do not believe this case can be decided without enquiring into the parties’ intentions as manifested in the surrogacy agreement. Mark and Crispina are a couple who desired to have a child of their own genes but are physically unable to do so without the help of reproductive technology. They affirmatively intended the birth of the child, and took the steps necessary to effect in vitro fertilization. But for their acted-on intention, the child would not exist. Anna agreed to facilitate the procreation of Mark’s and Crispina’s child. The parties’ aim was to bring Mark’s and Crispina’s child into the world, not for Mark and Crispina to donate a zygote to Anna. Crispina from the outset intended to be the child’s mother. Although the gestative function Anna performed was necessary to bring about the child’s birth, it is safe to say that Anna would not have been given the opportunity to gestate or deliver the child had she, prior to implantation of the zygote, manifested her own intent to be the child’s mother. No reason appears why Anna’s later change of heart should vitiate the determination that Crispina is the child’s natural mother.

We conclude that although the Act recognizes both genetic consanguinity and giving birth as means of establishing a mother and child relationship, when the two means do not coincide in one woman, she who intended to procreate the child—that is, she who intended to bring about the birth of a child that she intended to raise as her own—is the natural mother under California law.10

Our conclusion finds support in the writings of several legal commentators. (See Hill, What Does It Mean to Be a “Parent”? The Claims of Biology *94 as the Basis for Parental Rights, supra, 66 N.Y.U. L.Rev. 353; Shultz, Reproductive Technology and Intent-Based Parenthood: An Opportunity for Gender Neutrality (1990) Wis. L.Rev. 297 [Shultz]; Note, Redefining Mother: A Legal Matrix for New Reproductive Technologies (1986) 96 Yale L.J. 187, 197-202 [Note].) Professor Hill, arguing that the genetic relationship per se should not be accorded priority in the determination of the parent-child relationship in the surrogacy context, notes that “while all of the players in the procreative arrangement are necessary in bringing a child into the world, the child would not have been bom but for the efforts of the intended parents. . ..[!].. . [T]he intended parents are the first cause, or the prime movers, of the procreative relationship.” (Hill, op. cit. supra, at p. 415, italics in original.)

Similarly, Professor Shultz observes that recent developments in the field of reproductive technology “dramatically extend affirmative intentionality. . . . Steps can be taken to bring into being a child who would not otherwise have existed.” (Shultz, op. cit. supra, p. 309.) “Within the context of artificial reproductive techniques,” Professor Shultz argues, “intentions that are voluntarily chosen, deliberate, express and bargained-for ought presumptively to determine legal parenthood.” (Id., at p. 323, fn. omitted.)

Another commentator has cogently suggested, in connection with reproductive technology, that “[t]he mental concept of the child is a controlling factor of its creation, and the originators of that concept merit full credit as conceivers. The mental concept must be recognized as independently valuable; it creates expectations in the initiating parents of a child, and it creates expectations in society for adequate performance on the part of the initiators as parents of the child.” (Note, op. cit. supra, 96 Yale L.J. at p. 196.)

Moreover, as Professor Shultz recognizes, the interests of children, particularly at the outset of their lives, are “[un]likely to run contrary to those of adults who choose to bring them into being.” (Shultz, op. cit. supra, at p. 397.) Thus, “[h]onoring the plans and expectations of adults who will be responsible for a child’s welfare is likely to correlate significantly with positive outcomes for parents and children alike.” (Ibid.) Under Anna’s interpretation of the Act, by contrast, a woman who agreed to géstate a fetus genetically related to the intending parents would, contrary to her expectations, be held to be the child’s natural mother, with all the responsibilities that ruling would entail, if the intending mother declined to accept the child after its birth. In what we must hope will be the extremely rare situation in *95which neither the gestator nor the woman who provided the ovum for fertilization is willing to assume custody of the child after birth, a rule recognizing the intending parents as the child’s legal, natural parents should best promote certainty and stability for the child.

In deciding the issue of maternity under the Act we have felt free to take into account the parties’ intentions, as expressed in the surrogacy contract, because in our view the agreement is not, on its face, inconsistent with public policy.

Preliminarily, Mark and Crispina urge us to interpret the Legislature’s 1992 passage of a bill that would have regulated surrogacy as an expression of this state’s public policy despite the fact that Governor Wilson’s veto prevented the bill from becoming law. Senate Bill No. 937 contained a finding that surrogate contracts are not against sound public and social policy. (Sen. Bill No. 937 (1991-1992 Reg. Sess.).) Had Senate Bill No. 937 become law, there would be no room for argument to the contrary. The veto, however, raises a question whether the legislative declaration truly expresses California’s public policy.

In the Governor’s veto message we find, not unequivocal agreement with the Legislature’s public policy assessment, but rather reservations about the practice of surrogate parenting. “Surrogacy is a relatively recent phenomenon. The full moral and psychological dimensions of this practice are not yet clear. In fact, they are just beginning to emerge. Only two published court opinions in California have treated this nettlesome subject. . . . Comprehensive regulation of this difficult moral issue is premature . ... [ID To the extent surrogacy continues to be practical, it can be governed by the legal framework already established in the family law area.” (Governor’s veto message to Sen. on Sen. Bill No. 937 (Sept. 26, 1992) Sen. Daily File (1991-1992 Reg. Sess.) p. 68.) Given this less than ringing endorsement of surrogate parenting, we conclude that the passage of Senate Bill No. 937, in and of itself, does not establish that surrogacy contracts are consistent with public policy. (Of course, neither do we draw the opposite conclusion from the fact of the Governor’s veto.)

Anna urges that surrogacy contracts violate several social policies. Relying on her contention that she is the child’s legal, natural mother, she cites the public policy embodied in Penal Code section 273, prohibiting the payment for consent to adoption of a child.11 She argues further that the policies underlying the adoption laws of this state are violated by the *96surrogacy contract because it in effect constitutes a prebirth waiver of her parental rights.

We disagree. Gestational surrogacy differs in crucial respects from adoption and so is not subject to the adoption statutes. The parties voluntarily agreed to participate in in vitro fertilization and related medical procedures before the child was conceived; at the time when Anna entered into the contract, therefore, she was not vulnerable to financial inducements to part with her own expected offspring. As discussed above, Anna was not the genetic mother of the child. The payments to Anna under the contract were meant to compensate her for her services in gestating the fetus and undergoing labor, rather than for giving up “parental” rights to the child. Payments were due both during the pregnancy and after the child’s birth. We are, accordingly, unpersuaded that the contract used in this case violates the public policies embodied in Penal Code section 273 and the adoption statutes. For the same reasons, we conclude these contracts do not implicate the policies underlying the statutes governing termination of parental rights. (See Welf. & Inst. Code, § 202.)

It has been suggested that gestational surrogacy may run afoul of prohibitions on involuntary servitude. (See U.S. Const., Amend. XIII; Cal. Const., art. I, § 6; Pen. Code, § 181.) Involuntary servitude has been recognized in cases of criminal punishment for refusal to work. (Pollock v. Williams (1944) 322 U.S. 4, 18 [88 L.Ed. 1095, 1104, 64 S.Ct. 792, 799]; see, generally, 7 Witkin, Summary of Cal. Law (9th ed. 1988) Constitutional Law, §§ 411-414, pp. 591-596.) We see no potential for that evil in the contract at issue here, and extrinsic evidence of coercion or duress is utterly lacking. We note that although at one point the contract purports to give Mark and Crispina the sole right to determine whether to abort the pregnancy, at another point it acknowledges: “All parties understand that a pregnant woman has the *97absolute right to abort or not abort any fetus she is carrying. Any promise to the contrary is unenforceable.” We therefore need not determine the validity of a surrogacy contract purporting to deprive the gestator of her freedom to terminate the pregnancy.

Finally, Anna and some commentators have expressed concern that surrogacy contracts tend to exploit or dehumanize women, especially women of lower economic status. Anna’s objections center around the psychological harm she asserts may result from the gestator’s relinquishing the child to whom she has given birth. Some have also cautioned that the practice of surrogacy may encourage society to view children as commodities, subject to trade at their parents’ will.

We are all too aware that the proper forum for resolution of this issue is the Legislature, where empirical data, largely lacking from this record, can be studied and rules of general applicability developed. However, in light of our responsibility to decide this case, we have considered as best we can its possible consequences.

We are unpersuaded that gestational surrogacy arrangements are so likely to cause the untoward results Anna cites as to demand their invalidation on public policy grounds. Although common sense suggests that women of lesser means serve as surrogate mothers more often than do wealthy women, there has been no proof that surrogacy contracts exploit poor women to any greater degree than economic necessity in general exploits them by inducing them to accept lower-paid or otherwise undesirable employment. We are likewise unpersuaded by the claim that surrogacy will foster the attitude that children are mere commodities; no evidence is offered to support it. The limited data available seem to reflect an absence of significant adverse effects of surrogacy on all participants.12

The argument that a woman cannot knowingly and intelligently agree to géstate and deliver a baby for intending parents carries overtones of the reasoning that for centuries prevented women from attaining equal economic rights and professional status under the law. To resurrect this view is both to foreclose a personal and economic choice on the part of the surrogate mother, and to deny intending parents what may be their only means of procreating a child of their own genes. Certainly in the present case it cannot seriously be argued that Anna, a licensed vocational nurse who had done well in school and who had previously borne a child, lacked the intellectual wherewithal or life experience necessary to make an informed decision to enter into the surrogacy contract.

*98 Constitutionality of the Determination That Anna Johnson Is Not the Natural Mother

Anna argues at length that her right to the continued companionship of the child is protected under the federal Constitution.

First, we note the constitutional rights that are not implicated here.

There is no issue of procedural due process: although Anna broadly contends that the procedures prescribed for adoptions should be followed in the situation of a gestational surrogate’s relinquishment to the genetic parents of the child she has carried and delivered, she cites no specific deficiency in the notice or hearing this matter received.

Furthermore, neither Anna nor amicus curiae ACLU articulates a claim under the equal protection clause, and we are unable to discern in these facts the necessary predicate to its operation. This is because a woman who voluntarily agrees to géstate and deliver for a married couple a child who is their genetic offspring is situated differently from the wife who provides the ovum for fertilization, intending to mother the resulting child.

Anna relies mainly on theories of substantive due process, privacy, and procreative freedom, citing a number of decisions recognizing the fundamental liberty interest of natural parents in the custody and care of their children. (See, e.g., Santosky v. Kramer (1982) 455 U.S. 745, 768 [71 L.Ed.2d 599, 616, 102 S.Ct. 1388]; Lassiter v. Department of Social Services (1981) 452 U.S. 18, 27 [68 L.Ed.2d 640, 649, 101 S.Ct. 2153]; Smith v. Organization of Foster Families (1977) 431 U.S. 816, 842 [53 L.Ed.2d 14, 33-34, 97 S.Ct. 2094]; Stanley v. Illinois (1972) 405 U.S. 645, 651 [31 L.Ed.2d 551, 558, 92 S.Ct. 1208].) Most of the cases Anna cites deal with the rights of unwed fathers in the face of attempts to terminate their parental relationship to their children. (See, e.g., Stanley v. Illinois, supra, 405 U.S. at pp. 658-659 [31 L.Ed.2d at pp. 562-563]; Quilloin v. Walcott (1978) 434 U.S. 246, 247-248 [54 L.Ed.2d 511, 515-516, 98 S.Ct. 549]; Caban v. Mohammed (1979) 441 U.S. 380 [60 L.Ed.2d 297, 99 S.Ct. 1760]; Lehr v. Robertson (1983) 463 U.S. 248 [77 L.Ed.2d 614, 103 S.Ct. 2985].) These cases do not support recognition of parental rights for a gestational surrogate. Although Anna quotes language stressing the primacy of a developed parent-child relationship in assessing unwed fathers’ rights (see Lehr v. Robertson, supra, 463 U.S. at pp. 260-262 [77 L.Ed.2d at pp. 625-627]), certain language in the cases reinforces the importance of genetic parents’ rights. (Lehr v. Robertson, supra, 463 U.S. at p. 262 [77 L.Ed.2d at p. 627] [“The significance of the biological connection is that it offers the natural *99father an opportunity that no other male possesses to develop a relationship with his offspring. If he grasps that opportunity and accepts some measure of responsibility for the child’s future, he may enjoy the blessings of the parent-child relationship and make uniquely valuable contributions to the child’s development.”]; see also Adoption of Kelsey S. (1992) 1 Cal.4th 816, 838 [4 Cal.Rptr.2d 615, 823 P.2d 1216] [“The biological connection between father and child is unique and worthy of constitutional protection if the father grasps the opportunity to develop that biological connection into a full and enduring relationship.”].)

Anna’s argument depends on a prior determination that she is indeed the child’s mother. Since Crispina is the child’s mother under California law because she, not Anna, provided the ovum for the in vitro fertilization procedure, intending to raise the child as her own, it follows that any constitutional interests Anna possesses in this situation are something less than those of a mother. As counsel for the minor points out, the issue in this case is not whether Anna’s asserted rights as a natural mother were unconstitutionally violated, but rather whether the determination that she is not the legal natural mother at all is constitutional.13

Anna relies principally on the decision of the United States Supreme Court in Michael H. v. Gerald D. (1989) 491 U.S. 110 [105 L.Ed.2d 91, 109 S.Ct. 2333], to support her claim to a constitutionally protected liberty interest in the companionship of the child, based on her status as “birth mother.” In that case, a plurality of the court held that a state may constitutionally deny a man parental rights with respect to a child he fathered during a liaison with the wife of another man, since it is the marital family that traditionally has been accorded a protected liberty interest, as reflected in the historic presumption of legitimacy of a child born into such a family. (491 U.S. at pp. 124-125 [105 L.Ed.2d at pp. 106-107] (plur. opn. by Scalia, J.).) The reasoning of the plurality in Michael H. does not assist Anna. Society has not traditionally protected the right of a woman who gestates and delivers a baby pursuant to an agreement with a couple who supply the zygote from which the baby develops and who intend to raise the child as their own; such arrangements are of too recent an origin to claim the protection of tradition. To the extent that tradition has a bearing on the present case, we believe it supports the claim of the couple who exercise their right to procreate in order to form a family of their own, albeit through novel medical procedures.

*100Moreover, if we were to conclude that Anna enjoys some sort of liberty interest in the companionship of the child, then the liberty interests of Mark and Crispina, the child’s natural parents, in their procreative choices and their relationship with the child would perforce be infringed. Any parental rights Anna might successfully assert could come only at Crispina’s expense. As we have seen, Anna has no parental rights to the child under California law, and she fails to persuade us that sufficiently strong policy reasons exist to accord her a protected liberty interest in the companionship of the child when such an interest would necessarily detract from or impair the parental bond enjoyed by Mark and Crispina.

Amicus curiae ACLU urges that Anna’s right of privacy, embodied in the California Constitution (Cal. Const., art. I, § 1), requires recognition and protection of her status as “birth mother.” We cannot agree. Certainly it is true that our state Constitution has been construed to provide California citizens with privacy protections encompassing procreative decisionmaking —broader, indeed, than those recognized by the federal Constitution. (Compare Committee to Defend Reproductive Rights v. Myers (1981) 29 Cal.3d 252, 263 [172 Cal.Rptr. 866, 625 P.2d 779, 20 A.L.R.4th 1118] with Harris v. McRae (1980) 448 U.S. 297, 315-318 [65 L.Ed.2d 784, 803-806, 100, S.Ct. 2671] [reaching opposing results on the question of whether state and federal Constitutions, respectively, permit legislative denial of funding for abortions for indigent women].) However, amicus curiae fails to articulate persuasively how Anna’s claim falls within even the broad parameters of the state right of privacy. Amicus curiae appears to assume that the choice to géstate and deliver a baby for its genetic parents pursuant to a surrogacy agreement is the equivalent, in constitutional weight, of the decision whether to bear a child of one’s own. We disagree. A woman who enters into a gestational surrogacy arrangement is not exercising her own right to make procreative choices; she is agreeing to provide a necessary and profoundly important service without (by definition) any expectation that she will raise the resulting child as her own.

Drawing an analogy to artificial insemination, Anna argues that Mark and Crispina were mere genetic donors who are entitled to no constitutional protection. That characterization of the facts is, however, inaccurate. Mark and Crispina never intended to “donate” genetic material to anyone. Rather, they intended to procreate a child genetically related to them by the only available means. Civil Code section 7005, governing artificial insemination, has no application here.14

Finally, Anna argues that the Act’s failure to address novel reproductive techniques such as in vitro fertilization indicates legislative disapproval of *101such practices. Given that the Act was drafted long before such techniques were developed, we cannot agree. Moreover, we may not arrogate to ourselves the power to disapprove them. It is not the role of the judiciary to inhibit the use of reproductive technology when the Legislature has not seen fit to do so; any such effort would raise serious questions in light of the fundamental nature of the rights of procreation and privacy. Rather, our task has been to resolve the dispute before us, interpreting the Act’s use of the term “natural mother” (Civ. Code, § 7003, subd. (1)) when the biological functions essential to bringing a child into the world have been allocated between two women.

Disposition

The judgment of the Court of Appeal is affirmed.

Lucas, C. J., Mosk, J., Baxter, J., and George, J., concurred.

ARABIAN, J., Concurring.

I concur in the decision to find under the Uniform Parentage Act that Crispina Calvert is the natural mother of the child she at all times intended to parent and raise as her own with her husband Mark, the child’s natural father. That determination answers the question on which this court granted review, and in my view sufficiently resolves the controversy between the parties to warrant no further analysis. I therefore decline to subscribe to the dictum in which the majority find surrogacy contracts “not . . . inconsistent with public policy.” (Maj. opn., ante, pp. 95-97.)

Surrogacy contracts touch upon one of the most, if not the most, sensitive subjects of human endeavor. Not only does the birth of a new generation perpetuate our species, it allows every parent to contribute, both genetically and socially, to our collective understanding of what it means to be human. Every child also offers the opportunity of a unique lifetime relationship, potentially more satisfying and fulfilling than any other pursuit. (See Adoption of Kelsey S. (1992) 1 Cal.4th 816, 837 [4 Cal.Rptr.2d 615, 823 P.2d 1216].)

*102The multiplicity of considerations at issue in a surrogacy situation plainly transcend traditional principles of contract law and require careful, nonadversarial analysis. For this reason, I do not think it wise for this court to venture unnecessarily into terrain more appropriately cleared by the Legislature in the first instance. In this regard, the Florida Supreme Court made the following pertinent observations; although the factual context obviously differs, socially and morally it compares in the most profound respects: “Because the issue with all its ramifications is fraught with complexity and encompasses the interests of the law, both civil and criminal, medical ethics and social morality, it is not one which is well-suited for resolution in an adversary judicial proceeding. It is the type [of] issue which is more suitably addressed in the legislative forum, where fact finding can be less confined and the viewpoints of all interested institutions and disciplines can be presented and synthesized. In this manner only can the subject be dealt with comprehensively and the interests of all institutions and individuals be properly accommodated.” (Satz v. Perlmutter (Fla. 1980) 379 So.2d 359, 360, affg. (Fla.Dist.Ct.App. 1978) 362 So.2d 160.) The New Jersey Supreme Court echoed similar cautionary tones in Matter of Conroy (1985) 98 N.J. 321 [486 A.2d 1209, 48 A.L.R.4th 1]: “As an elected body, the Legislature is better able than any other single institution to reflect the social values at stake. In addition, it has the resources and ability to synthesize vast quantities of data and opinions from a variety of fields and to formulate general guidelines that may be applicable to a broad range of situations.” (Id., 486 A.2d at pp. 1220-1221; accord, Matter of Guardianship of Hamlin (1984) 102 Wn.2d 810, 821-822 [689 P.2d 1372, 1378-1379].)

Clearly, this court should not avoid proper resolution of the issue before it. “[T]he law, equity and justice must not themselves quail and be helpless in the face of modern technological marvels presenting questions hitherto unthought of.” (In re Quinlan (1976) 70 N.J. 10, 44 [355 A.2d 647, 665, 79 A.L.R.3d 205], cert. den. sub nom. Garger v. New Jersey, 429 U.S. 922 [50 L.Ed.2d 289, 97 S.Ct. 319].) Nevertheless, I would not move beyond the available legal mechanism into such socially and morally uncharted waters. The implications of addressing the general soundness of surrogacy contracts are vast and profound. To date, the legislative process has failed to produce a satisfactory answer. This court should be chastened and not emboldened by that failure.

KENNARD, J., Dissenting.

When a woman who wants to have a child provides her fertilized ovum to another woman who carries it through pregnancy and gives birth to a child, who is the child’s legal mother? Unlike the majority, I do not agree that the determinative consideration should be the intent to have the child that originated with the woman who contributed *103the ovum. In my view, the woman who provided the fertilized ovum and the woman who gave birth to the child both have substantial claims to legal motherhood. Pregnancy entails a unique commitment, both psychological and emotional, to an unborn child. No less substantial, however, is the contribution of the woman from whose egg the child developed and without whose desire the child would not exist.

For each child, California law accords the legal rights and responsibilities of parenthood to only one “natural mother.” When, as here, the female reproductive role is divided between two women, California law requires courts to make a decision as to which woman is the child’s natural mother, but provides no standards by which to make that decision. The majority’s resort to “intent” to break the “tie” between the genetic and gestational mothers is unsupported by statute, and, in the absence of appropriate protections in the law to guard against abuse of surrogacy arrangements, it is ill-advised. To determine who is the legal mother of a child born of a gestational surrogacy arrangement, I would apply the standard most protective of child welfare—the best interests of the child.

I. Factual Background

This case arises from an agreement made between Mark and Crispina Calvert, a married couple, and Anna Johnson, a single woman. As the result of a hysterectomy, Crispina was unable to become pregnant, although her ovaries could still produce eggs. When she and her husband Mark desired to have a child, they arranged with Anna for Anna’s impregnation with an embryo formed from Crispina’s egg and Mark’s sperm. Mark and Crispina agreed to pay Anna installment payments totaling $10,000, the last installment not due until six weeks after Anna gave birth. In exchange, Anna agreed to carry the child to term and, after giving birth, to relinquish her parental rights to the child.

Six months into the pregnancy, Anna’s relationship with Mark and Crispina broke down. Both sides filed lawsuits seeking declarations of parental rights in the unborn child. While these consolidated actions were still pending, on September 19, 1990, Anna gave birth. By agreement of the parties, the court awarded immediate custody of the child to Mark and Crispina, but granted visitation rights to Anna.

The matter went to trial in October 1990. The parties stipulated that Mark and Crispina were the genetic parents of the child to whom Anna had given birth. The trial court ruled in favor of Mark and Crispina, concluding that as the child’s “genetic” and “biological” father and mother, they were also his “natural” father and mother. The Court of Appeal affirmed.

*104We granted review to address an issue of first impression: Under California law, how does a court determine who is the legal mother of a child born of a gestational surrogacy arrangement?

II. This Opinion’s Approach

The determination of a question of parental rights to a child born of a surrogacy arrangement was before the New Jersey Supreme Court in Matter of Baby M. (1988) 109 N.J. 396 [537 A.2d 1227, 77 A.L.R.4th 1], a case that received worldwide attention. But in the surrogacy arrangement at issue there the woman who gave birth to the child, Marybeth Whitehead, had been impregnated by artificial insemination with the sperm of the intending father, William Stern. Whitehead thus provided the genetic material and carried the fetus to term. This case is different, because here those two aspects of the female role in reproduction were divided between two women. This process is known as “gestational” surrogacy, to distinguish it from the surrogacy arrangement involved in Baby M.1

In this opinion, I first discuss gestational surrogacy in light of the medical advances that have made it a reality. I next consider the wider social and philosophical implications of using gestational surrogacy to give birth to a child, and set out some of the suggested models for deciding the child’s parentage in this situation. I then review a comprehensive model legislative scheme, not enacted in California, designed to accommodate the interests of all participants in surrogacy arrangements. I next turn to California’s Uniform Parentage Act, and critique the majority’s reliance on “intent” as the determinative factor under that act in deciding who is the “natural,” and thus legal, mother of a child born of a gestational surrogacy arrangement. Finally, I explain why, in the absence of legislation designed to address the unique problems of gestational surrogacy, courts deciding who is the legal mother of a child born of gestational surrogacy should look to the best interests of that child.

*105III. Gestational Surrogacy

Recent advances in medical technology have dramatically expanded the means of human reproduction. Among the new technologies are in vitro fertilization, embryo and gamete freezing and storage, gamete intra-fallopian transfer, and embryo transplantation. (Shultz, Reproductive Technology and Intent-Based Parenthood: An Opportunity for Gender Neutrality, 1990 Wis.L.Rev. 297, 299 fn. 5 [hereafter Reproductive Technology].) Gestational surrogacy is the result of two of these techniques: in vitro fertilization and embryo transplantation. (See Shalev, Birth Power: The Case for Surrogacy (Yale U. Press 1989) p. 115.)

In vitro fertilization or IVF is the fertilization of a human egg outside the human body in a laboratory. Children that have been conceived this way are often called “test tube babies,” because their actual conception took place in a petri dish. The first live birth of a child conceived in vitro occurred in 1979 in Great Britain after 20 years of research by a British team. (Shalev, Birth Power: The Case for Surrogacy, supra, at p. 105.)

To facilitate the retrieval or “harvesting” of eggs for in vitro fertilization, a woman ingests fertility hormones to induce “superovulation” or the production of multiple eggs. The eggs are then removed through aspiration, a nonsurgical technique, or through an invasive surgical procedure known as laparoscopy. (See generally Developments in the Law: Medical Technology and the Law (1990) 103 Harv.L.Rev. 1519, 1537-1542 [hereafter Medical Technology].) To undergo superovulation and egg retrieval is taxing, both physically and emotionally; the hormones used for superovulation produce bodily changes similar to those experienced in pregnancy, while the surgical removal of mature eggs has been likened to caesarian-section childbirth. (Id., at p. 1540; Shalev, Birth Power: The Case for Surrogacy, supra, at pp. 117-118.)

After removal, eggs are exposed to live sperm in a petri dish. If an egg is fertilized, the resulting zygote is allowed to divide and become multicellular before uterine implantation. The expense and low success rate of in vitro fertilization demonstrate j'ust how much prospective parents are willing to endure to achieve biological parenthood. (Medical Technology, supra, 103 Harv.L.Rev. at p. 1539.)

Generally, an egg fertilized in vitro is implanted in the uterus of the woman who produced it. The technique, however, allows for embryo transplantation, which is the transfer of an embryo formed from one woman’s egg to the uterus of another woman who will gestate the fetus to term. This can *106take place in at least three different situations: (1) a woman may donate an egg that, when fertilized, will be implanted in the uterus of a woman who intends to raise the child; (2) the woman who provides the egg may herself intend to raise the child carried to term by a gestational surrogate; or (3) a couple desiring a child may arrange for a surrogate to gestate an embryo produced from an egg and sperm, both donated (perhaps by close relatives of the couple). (Goodwin, Determination of Legal Parentage in Egg Donation, Embryo Transplantation, and Gestational Surrogacy Arrangements (1992) 26 Fam.L.Q. 275, 276-277 [hereafter Determination of Legal Parentage].)

The division of the female reproductive role in gestational surrogacy points up the three discrete aspects of motherhood: genetic, gestational and social. The woman who contributes the egg that becomes the fetus has played the genetic role of motherhood; the gestational aspect is provided by the woman who carries the fetus to term and gives birth to the child; and the woman who ultimately raises the child and assumes the responsibilities of parenthood is the child’s social mother. (Shalev, Birth Power: The Case for Surrogacy, supra, at p. 115; see also Macklin, Artificial Means of Reproduction and Our Understanding of the Family (1991) 21 Hastings Center Rep. 5, 6.)

IV. Policy Considerations

The ethical, moral and legal implications of using gestational surrogacy for human reproduction have engendered substantial debate. A review of the scholarly literature that addresses gestational surrogacy reveals little consensus on the desirability of surrogacy arrangements, particularly those involving paid surrogacy, or on how best to decide questions of the parentage of children born of such arrangements.

Surrogacy proponents generally contend that gestational surrogacy, like the other reproductive technologies that extend the ability to procreate to persons who might not otherwise be able to have children, enhances “individual freedom, fulfillment and responsibility.” (Shultz, Reproductive Technology, supra, 1990 Wis.L.Rev. 297, 303.) Under this view, women capable of bearing children should be allowed to freely agree to be paid to do so by infertile couples desiring to form a family. (Shalev, Birth Power: The Case for Surrogacy, supra, at p. 145 [arguing for a “free market in reproduction” in which the “reproducing woman” operates as an “autonomous moral and economic agent”]; see also Posner, Economic Analysis of Law (3d ed. 1986) p. 139; Landes & Posner, The Economics of the Baby Shortage (1978) 7 J. Legal Stud. 323 [proposing a “market in babies”].) The “surrogate mother” is expected “to weigh the prospective investment in her birthing labor” *107before entering into the arrangement, and, if her “autonomous reproductive decision” is “voluntary,” she should be held responsible for it so as “to fulfill the expectations of the other parties . . . (Shalev, Birth Power: The Case for Surrogacy, supra, at p. 96.)

One constitutional law scholar argues that the use of techniques such as gestational surrogacy is constitutionally protected and should be restricted only on a showing of a compelling state interest. (Robertson, Procreative Liberty and the Control of Conception, Pregnancy, and Childbirth (1983) 69 Va.L.Rev. 405; Robertson, Procreative Liberty and the State’s Burden of Proof in Regulating Noncoital Reproduction, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, pp. 24-26, 35; Robertson, Embryos, Families, and Procreative Liberty: The Legal Structure of the New Reproduction (1986) 59 So.Cal.L.Rev. 939, 960.) Professor Robertson reasons that procreation is itself protected under decisions of the United States Supreme Court that affirm the basic civil right to marry and raise children. (Robertson, Procreative Liberty and the Control of Conception, Pregnancy, and Childbirth, supra, 69 Va.L.Rev. at p. 414, fns. 22, 23, citing Meyer v. Nebraska (1923) 262 U.S. 390, 399 [67 L.Ed. 1042, 1045, 43 S.Ct. 625, 29 A.L.R. 1446] [“right... to marry, establish a home and bring up children” protected by the Fourteenth Amendment]; Skinner v. Oklahoma (1942) 316 U.S. 535, 541 [86 L.Ed. 1655, 1660, 62 S.Ct. 1110] [describing marriage and procreation as basic human civil rights]; Stanley v. Illinois (1972) 405 U.S. 645, 651 [31 L.Ed.2d 551, 558-559, 92 S.Ct. 1208] [emphasizing the importance of the rights “to conceive and raise one’s children”].) From this premise, he argues that the right to procreate should extend to persons who cannot conceive or bear children. (Robertson, Procreative Liberty and the Control of Conception, Pregnancy and Childbirth, supra, 69 Va.L.Rev. at p. 411 [“Sterility bars one from conceiving or bearing only to the extent that medicine or society cannot overcome the particular cause of infertility”]; Robertson, Embryos, Families, and Procreative Liberty: The Legal Structure of the New Reproduction, supra, 59 So.Cal.L.Rev. at p. 960 [“The use of noncoital techniques . . . should . . . also be protected.”].)

Professor Robertson’s thesis of broad application of the right of privacy for all procreational techniques has been questioned, however, in light of recent United States Supreme Court jurisprudence. (See Medical Technology, supra, 103 Harv.L.Rev. 1519, 1530, citing Michael H. v. Gerald D. (1989) 491 U.S. 110 [105 L.Ed.2d 91, 109 S.Ct. 2333], as evidence of the high court’s reluctance “to extend the right of privacy to new relationships and activities” that the court has not perceived to merit “traditional protection.”)

Surrogacy critics, however, maintain that the payment of money for the gestation and relinquishment of a child threatens the economic exploitation *108of poor women who may be induced to engage in commercial surrogacy arrangements out of financial need. (Capron & Radin, Choosing Family Law Over Contract Law as a Paradigm for Surrogate Motherhood, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, p. 62.) Some fear the development of a “breeder” class of poor women who will be regularly employed to bear children for the economically advantaged. (See Women and Children Used in Systems of Surrogacy: Position Statement of the Institute on Women and Technology, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at p. 322; and Corea, Junk Liberty, testimony before Cal. Assem. Judiciary Com., April 5,1988, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at pp. 325, 335.) Others suggest that women who enter into surrogacy arrangements may underestimate the psychological impact of relinquishing a child they have nurtured in their bodies for nine months. (See Macklin, Artificial Means of Reproduction and Our Understanding of the Family, supra, 21 Hastings Center Rep. 5, 10.)

Gestational surrogacy is also said to be “dehumanizing” (Capron & Radin, Choosing Family Law Over Contract Law as a Paradigm for Surrogate Motherhood, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at p. 62) and to “commodify” women and children by treating the female reproductive capacity and the children born of gestational surrogacy arrangements as products that can be bought and sold (Radin, Market-Inalienability (1987) 100 Harv.L.Rev. 1849, 1930-1932). The commodification of women and children, it is feared, will reinforce oppressive gender stereotypes and threaten the well-being of all children. (Medical Technology, supra, 103 Harv.L.Rev. 1519, 1550; Annas, Fairy Tales Surrogate Mothers Tell, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, p. 50.) Some critics foresee promotion of an ever-expanding “business of surrogacy brokerage.” (E.g., Goodwin, Determination of Legal Parentage, supra, 26 Fam.L.Q. at p. 283.)

Whether surrogacy contracts are viewed as personal service agreements or agreements for the sale of the child born as the result of the agreement, commentators critical of contractual surrogacy view these contracts as contrary to public policy and thus not enforceable. (Radin, Market-Inalienability, supra, 100 Harv.L.Rev. at p. 1924, fn. 261; Capron & Radin, Choosing Family Law Over Contract Law as a Paradigm for Surrogate Motherhood, supra, in Surrogate Motherhood, at pp. 62-63; see also Krimmel, Can Surrogate Parenting Be Stopped? An Inspection of the Constitutional and Pragmatic Aspects of Outlawing Surrogate Mother Arrangements (1992) 27 Val.U.L.Rev. 1, 4-5.)

Organizations representing diverse viewpoints share many of the concerns highlighted by the legal commentators. For example, the American Medical Association considers the conception of a child for relinquishment after birth *109to pose grave ethical problems. (Rep. of the Judicial Council, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at p. 304.) Likewise, the official position of the Catholic Church is that surrogacy arrangements are “ ‘contrary to the unity of marriage and to the dignity of the procreation of the human person.’ ” (Magisterium of the Catholic Church, Instruction on Respect for Human Life in Its Origin and on the Dignity of Procreation: Replies to Certain Questions of the Day 25 (Feb. 22, 1987), cited in Radin, Market-Inalienability, supra, 100 Harv.L.Rev. 1849, 1928, fn. 271.)

The policy statement of the New York State Task Force on Life and the Law sums up the broad range of ethical problems that commercial surrogacy arrangements are viewed to present: “The gestation of children as a service for others in exchange for a fee is a radical departure from the way in which society understands and values pregnancy. It substitutes commercial values for the web of social, affective and moral meanings associated with human reproduction .... This transformation has profound implications for childbearing, for women, and for the relationship between parents and the children they bring into the world. [][]... [f] Surrogate parenting allows the genetic, gestational and social components of parenthood to be fragmented, creating unprecedented relationships among people bound together by contractual obligation rather than by the bonds of kinship and caring. ... [SI] ...[][]... Surrogate parenting alters deep-rooted social and moral assumptions about the relationship between parents and children. . . . [<j[]. . . [It] is premised on the ability and willingness of women to abdicate [their parental] responsibility without moral compunction or regret [and] makes the obligations that accompany parenthood alienable and negotiable.” (New York State Task Force on Life and the Law, Surrogate Parenting: Analysis and Recommendations for Public Policy (May 1988) in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at pp. 317-318.)

Proponents and critics of gestational surrogacy propose widely differing approaches for deciding who should be the legal mother of a child bom of a gestational surrogacy arrangement. Surrogacy advocates propose to enforce pre-conception contracts in which gestational mothers have agreed to relinquish parental rights, and, thus, would make “bargained-for intentions determinative of legal parenthood.” (Shultz, Reproductive Technology, supra, 1990 Wis.L.Rev. at p. 323.) Professor Robertson, for instance, contends that “The right to noncoital, collaborative reproduction also includes the right of the parties to agree how they should allocate their obligations and entitlements with respect to the child. Legal presumptions of paternity and maternity would be overridden by this agreement of the parties.” (Robertson, Procreative Liberty and the Control of Conception, Pregnancy, and Childbirth, supra, 69 Va.L.Rev. 405, 436; see also Shalev, Birth Power: The Case *110for Surrogacy, supra, at p. 141 [arguing for enforcing the parties’ legal expectations].)

Surrogacy critics, on the other hand, consider the unique female role in human reproduction as the determinative factor in questions of legal parentage. They reason that although males and females both contribute genetic material for the child, the act of gestating the fetus falls only on the female. (See Radin, Market-Inalienability, supra, 100 Harv.L.Rev. 1849, 1932, fn. 285 [pointing out the “asymmetrical” interests of males and females in human reproduction].) Accordingly, in their view, a woman who, as the result of gestational surrogacy, is not genetically related to the child she bears is like any other woman who gives birth to a child. In either situation the woman giving birth is the child’s mother. (See Capron & Radin, Choosing Family Law Over Contract Law as a Paradigm for Surrogate Motherhood, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at pp. 64-65.) Under this approach, the laws governing adoption should govern the parental rights to a child bom of gestational surrogacy. Upon the birth of the child, the gestational mother can decide whether or not to relinquish her parental rights in favor of the genetic mother. (Ibid.)

V. Model Legislation

The debate over whom the law should recognize as the legal mother of a child born of a gestational surrogacy arrangement prompted the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws to propose the Uniform Status of Children of Assisted Conception Act. (9B West’s U. Laws Ann. (1992 Supp.) Uniform Status of Children of Assisted Conception Act (1988 Act) pp. 122-137 [hereafter also USCACA].) This model legislation addresses many of the concerns discussed above.

The commissioners gave careful consideration to the competing interests of the various participants in assisted conception arrangements, and sought to accommodate those interests in the model legislation. Their overriding concern, however, was the well-being of children born of gestational surrogacy and other types of assisted conception. As the foreword to the model legislation notes, the extraordinary circumstances of these children’s births deprive them of parentage in the traditional sense. (9B West’s U. Laws Ann. (1992 Supp.) USCACA, supra, at p. 123.) Thus, the intent of the proposed legislation was to define with precision the legal status of these children as well as to codify the rights of the other participants in a surrogacy arrangement. The commissioners proposed alternative versions of the USCACA: one that would disallow gestational surrogacy and another that would permit it only under court supervision.

*111In its key components, the proposed legislation provides that “a woman who gives birth to a child is the child’s mother” (USCACA, § 2) unless a court has approved a surrogacy agreement before conception (USCACA, § 5, 6). In the absence of such court approval, any surrogacy agreement would be void. (USCACA, § 5, subd. (b).) If, however, the arrangement for gestational surrogacy has court approval, “the intended parents are the parents of the child.” (USCACA, § 8, subd. (a)(1).)

To obtain court approval, the parties to the surrogacy arrangement must file a petition. (USCACA, § 6, subd. (a).) The model legislation provides for the court to appoint a guardian ad litem for the intended child and legal counsel for the surrogate mother. {Ibid.) Before approving a surrogacy arrangement, the trial court must conduct a hearing and enter detailed findings, including the following: medical evidence shows the intended mother’s inability to bear a child or that for her to do so poses an unreasonable risk to the unborn child or to the physical or mental health of the intended mother; all parties to the surrogacy agreement (including the surrogate’s husband if she has one) meet the standards of fitness of adoptive parents; the agreement was voluntary and all parties understand its terms; the surrogate mother has undergone at least one successful pregnancy and medical evidence shows that another pregnancy will not endanger her physical or mental health or pose an unreasonable risk to the unborn child; and all parties have received professional mental health counseling pertaining to the effect of the surrogacy arrangement. (USCACA, § 6, subd. (b).) These provisions serve to minimize the potential for overreaching and to ensure that all parties to a surrogacy arrangement understand their respective roles and obligations.

The USCACA offers predictability in delineating the parentage of children born of gestational surrogacy arrangements. Under the model legislation, if enacted, there would never be a question as to who has the legal responsibility for a child born of a gestational surrogacy arrangement: If the couple who initiated the surrogacy had complied with the provisions of the legislation, they would be the child’s legal parents. If they had not, the rights and responsibilities of parenthood would go to the woman who gave birth to the child and her spouse.

Because California Legislature has not enacted the Uniform Status of Children of Assisted Conception Act, its provisions were not followed in this case.

*112VI. The Uniform Parentage Act

The only California statute defining parental rights is the Uniform Parentage Act (hereafter also UPA). (See Civ. Code, § 7000 et seq.).2 The Legislature enacted the UPA to abolish the concept of illegitimacy and to replace it with the concept of parentage. (Adoption of Kelsey S. (1992) 1 Cal.4th 816, 828 [4 Cal.Rptr.2d 615, 823 P.2d 1216].) The UPA was never intended by the Legislature to govern the issues arising from new reproductive technologies such as gestational surrogacy. Nevertheless, the UPA is on its face broadly applicable, and it is in any event the only statutory guidance this court has in resolving this case.

The provisions of the UPA “extend[] equally to every child and to every parent, regardless of the marital status of the parents.” (§ 7002.) The parent-child relationship defined by the UPA accords a child’s parents both rights and obligations. (§ 7001.) A primary focus of the UPA is the determination of paternity and enforcement of financial responsibility. (§§ 7006 [actions to determine paternity], 7012 [specifying financial support obligations].)

When a child is bom by gestational surrogacy, as happened here, the two women who played biological roles in creating the child will both have statutory claims under the UPA to being the child’s natural mother. The UPA permits a woman to establish that she is “the natural mother” of a child by “proof of. . . having given birth to the child . . . .” (§ 7003, subd. (1).) Thus, a gestational mother qualifies as a “natural mother” under the statute. (Ibid.) Alternatively, the UPA allows a woman to prove she is a mother in the same manner as a man may prove he is a father. (§§ 7003, subd. (1), 7015 [permitting actions to establish a mother and child relationship using parts of the UPA “applicable to the father and child relationship”].) A man may demonstrate he is a child’s natural father through genetic marker evidence derived from blood testing. (§ 7004, subd. (a); Evid. Code, §§ 621, 892, 895.) Accordingly, a genetic mother may also demonstrate she is a child’s natural mother through such genetic evidence. Here, both Anna, the gestational mother, and Crispina, the genetic mother, have offered proof acceptable under the UPA to qualify as the child’s natural mother.

By its use of the phrase “the natural mother,” however, the UPA contemplates that a child will have only one natural mother. (§ 7003, subd. (1), italics added.) But the UPA provides no standards for determining who that natural mother should be when, as here, two different women can offer biological proof of being the natural mother of the same child under its *113provisions. Thus, the UPA by its terms cannot resolve the conflict in this case.

VII. Analysis of the Majority’s “Intent” Test

Faced with the failure of current statutory law to adequately address the issue of who is a child’s natural mother when two women qualify under the UPA, the majority breaks the “tie” by resort to a criterion not found in the UPA—the “intent” of the genetic mother to be the child’s mother.

This case presents a difficult issue. The majority’s resolution of that issue deserves serious consideration. Ultimately, however, I cannot agree that “intent” is the appropriate test for resolving this case.

The majority offers four arguments in support of its conclusion to rely on the intent of the genetic mother as the exclusive determinant for deciding who is the natural mother of a child born of gestational surrogacy. Careful examination, however, demonstrates that none of the arguments mandates the majority’s conclusion.

The first argument that the majority uses in support of its conclusion that the intent of the genetic mother to bear a child should be dispositive of the question of motherhood is “but-for” causation. Specifically, the majority relies on a commentator who writes that in a gestational surrogacy arrangement, “ ‘the child would not have been born but for the efforts of the intended parents.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 94, quoting Hill, What Does It Mean to Be a “Parent”? The Claims of Biology as the Basis for Parental Rights (1991) 66 N.Y.U. L.Rev. 353, 415, original italics omitted, italics added.)

The majority’s resort to “but-for” causation is curious. The concept of “but-for” causation is a “test used in determining tort liability . . . .” (Black’s Law Dict. (6th ed. 1990) p. 200.) In California, the test for causation is whether the conduct was a “substantial factor” in bringing about the event. (Mitchell v. Gonzales (1991) 54 Cal.3d 1041, 1049, 1054, 1056 [1 Cal.Rptr.2d 913] [disapproving “but-for” jury instruction in tort cases].) Neither test for causation assists the majority, as I shall discuss.

The proposition that a woman who gives birth to a child after carrying it for nine months is a “substantial factor” in the child’s birth cannot reasonably be debated. Nor can it reasonably be questioned that “but for” the gestational mother, there would not be a child. Thus, the majority’s reliance on principles of causation is misplaced. Neither the “but for” nor the “substantial factor” test of causation provides any basis for preferring the *114genetic mother’s intent as the determinative factor in gestational surrogacy cases: Both the genetic and the gestational mothers are indispensable to the birth of a child in a gestational surrogacy arrangement.

Behind the majority’s reliance on “but-for” causation as justification for its intent test is a second, closely related argument. The majority draws its second rationale from a student note: “ ‘The mental concept of the child is a controlling factor of its creation, and the originators of that concept merit full credit as conceivers.’ ” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 94, quoting Note, Redefining Mother: A Legal Matrix for New Reproductive Technologies (1986) 96 Yale L.J. 187, 196.)

The “originators of the concept” rationale seems comfortingly familiar. The reason it seems familiar, however, is that it is a rationale that is frequently advanced as justifying the law’s protection of intellectual property. As stated by one author, “an idea belongs to its creator because the idea is a manifestation of the creator’s personality or self.” (Hughes, The Philosophy of Intellectual Property (1988) 77 Geo. L.J. 287, 330.) Thus, it may be argued, just as a song or invention is protected as the property of the “originator of the concept,” so too a child should be regarded as belonging to the originator of the concept of the child, the genetic mother.

The problem with this argument, of course, is that children are not property. Unlike songs or inventions, rights in children cannot be sold for consideration, or made freely available to the general public. Our most fundamental notions of personhood tell us it is inappropriate to treat children as property. Although the law may justly recognize that the originator of a concept has certain property rights in that concept, the originator of the concept of a child can have no such rights, because children cannot be owned as property. Accordingly, I cannot endorse the majority’s “originators of the concept” or intellectual property rationale for employing intent to break the “tie” between the genetic mother and the gestational mother of the child.

Next, the majority offers as its third rationale the notion that bargained-for expectations support its conclusion regarding the dispositive significance of the genetic mother’s intent. Specifically, the majority states that “ ‘intentions that are voluntarily chosen, deliberate, express and bargained-for ought presumptively to determine legal parenthood.’ ” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 94, quoting Schultz, Reproductive Technology, supra, 1990 Wis. L.Rev. at p. 323.)

It is commonplace that, in real or personal property transactions governed by contracts, “intentions that are voluntarily chosen, deliberate, express and *115bargained-for” ought presumptively to be enforced and, when one party seeks to escape performance, the court may order specific performance. (See, e.g., § 3384 et seq.; 11 Witkin, Summary of Cal. Law (9th ed. 1990) Equity, § 21, p. 698.) But the courts will not compel performance of all contract obligations. For instance, even when a party to a contract for personal services (such as employment) has wilfully breached the contract, the courts will not order specific enforcement of an obligation to perform that personal service. (§ 3390; see 11 Witkin, Summary of Cal. Law, supra, Equity, § 59, p. 736.) The unsuitability of applying the notion that, because contract intentions are “voluntarily chosen, deliberate, express and bargained-for,” their performance ought to be compelled by the courts is even more clear when the concept of specific performance is used to determine the course of the life of a child. Just as children are not the intellectual property of their parents, neither are they the personal property of anyone, and their delivery cannot be ordered as a contract remedy on the same terms that a court would, for example, order a breaching party to deliver a truckload of nuts and bolts.

Thus, three of the majority’s four arguments in support of its exclusive reliance on the intent of the genetic mother as determinative in gestational surrogacy cases cannot withstand analysis. And, as I shall discuss shortly, the majority’s fourth rationale has merit, but does not support the majority’s conclusion. But before turning to the majority’s fourth rationale, I shall discuss two additional considerations, not noted by the majority, that in my view also weigh against utilizing the intent of the genetic mother as the sole determinant of the result in this case and others like it.

First, in making the intent of the genetic mother who wants to have a child the dispositive factor, the majority renders a certain result preordained and inflexible in every such case: as between an intending genetic mother and a gestational mother, the genetic mother will, under the majority’s analysis, always prevail. The majority recognizes no meaningful contribution by a woman who agrees to carry a fetus to term for the genetic mother beyond that of mere employment to perform a specified biological function.

The majority’s approach entirely devalues the substantial claims of motherhood by a gestational mother such as Anna. True, a woman who enters into a surrogacy arrangement intending to raise the child has by her intent manifested an assumption of parental responsibility in addition to her biological contribution of providing the genetic material. (See Adoption of Kelsey S., supra, 1 Cal.4th at pp. 838, 849.) But the gestational mother’s biological contribution of carrying a child for nine months and giving birth is likewise an assumption of parental responsibility. (See Dolgin, Just a Gene: *116 Judicial Assumptions About Parenthood (1993) 40 UCLA L.Rev. 637, 659.) A pregnant woman’s commitment to the unborn child she carries is not just physical; it is psychological and emotional as well. The United States Supreme Court made a closely related point in Lehr v. Robertson (1983) 463 U.S. 248 [77 L.Ed.2d 614, 103 S.Ct. 2985], explaining that a father’s assertion of parental rights depended on his having assumed responsibility for the child after its birth, whereas a mother’s “parental relationship is clear” because she “carries and bears the child.” (Id. at p. 260, fn. 16 [77 L.Ed.2d at p. 626], quoting Caban v. Mohammed (1979) 441 U.S. 380, 397 [60 L.Ed.2d 297, 310, 99 S.Ct. 1760] (dis. opn. of Stewart, J.).)3 This court too has acknowledged that a pregnant woman and her unborn child comprise a “unique physical unit” and that the welfare of each is “intertwined and inseparable.” (Burgess v. Superior Court (1992) 2 Cal.4th 1064, 1080 [9 Cal.Rptr.2d 615, 831 P.2d 1197].) Indeed, a fetus would never develop into a living child absent its nurturing by the pregnant woman. (See Tribe, American Constitutional Law (2d ed. 1988) at p. 1357, citing Law, Rethinking Sex and the Constitution (1984) 132 U.Pa.L.Rev. 955, 1023.) A pregnant woman intending to bring a child into the world is more than a mere container or breeding animal; she is a conscious agent of creation no less than the genetic mother, and her humanity is implicated on a deep level. Her role should not be devalued.

To summarize, the woman who carried the fetus to term and brought a child into the world has, like the genetic mother, a substantial claim to be the natural mother of the child. The gestational mother has made an indispensable and unique biological contribution, and has also gone beyond biology in an intangible respect that, though difficult to label, cannot be denied. Accordingly, I cannot agree with the majority’s devaluation of the role of the gestational mother.

I find the majority’s reliance on “intent” unsatisfactory for yet another reason. By making intent determinative of parental rights to a child born of *117a gestational surrogacy arrangement, the majority would permit enforcement of a gestational surrogacy agreement without requiring any of the protections that would be afforded by the Uniform Status of Children of Assisted Conception Act. Under that act, the granting of parental rights to a couple that initiates a gestational surrogacy arrangement would be conditioned upon compliance with the legislation’s other provisions. They include court oversight of the gestational surrogacy arrangement before conception, legal counsel for the woman who agrees to gestate the child, a showing of need for the surrogacy, medical and mental health evaluations, and a requirement that all parties meet the standards of fitness of adoptive parents. (USCACA, §§ 5, 6.)

In my view, protective requirements such as those set forth in the USCACA are necessary to minimize any possibility in gestational surrogacy arrangements for overreaching or abuse by a party with economic advantage. As the New Jersey Supreme Court recognized, it will be a rare instance when a low income infertile couple can employ an upper income surrogate. (Matter of Baby M., supra, 537 A.2d 1227, 1249.) The model act’s carefully drafted provisions would assure that the surrogacy arrangement is a matter of medical necessity on the part of the intending parents, and not merely the product of a desire to avoid the inconveniences of pregnancy, together with the financial ability to do so. Also, by requiring both pre-conception psychological counseling for all parties and judicial approval, the model act would assure that parties enter into a surrogacy arrangement only if they are legally and psychologically capable of doing so and fully understand all the risks involved, and that the surrogacy arrangement would not be substantially detrimental to the interests of any individual. Moreover, by requiring judicial approval, the model act would significantly discourage the rapid expansion of commercial surrogacy brokerage and the resulting commodification of the products of pregnancy. In contrast, here the majority’s grant of parental rights to the intending mother contains no provisions for the procedural protections suggested by the commissioners who drafted the model act. The majority opinion is a sweeping endorsement of unregulated gestational surrogacy.

The majority’s final argument in support of using the intent of the genetic mother as the exclusive determinant of the outcome in gestational surrogacy cases is that preferring the intending mother serves the child’s interests, which are “ ‘[ujnlikely to run contrary to those of adults who choose to bring [the child] into being.’ ” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 94, quoting Schultz, Reproductive Technology, supra, 1990 Wis. L.Rev. at p. 397.)

I agree with the majority that the best interests of the child is an important goal; indeed, as I shall explain, the best interests of the child, rather than the *118intent of the genetic mother, is the proper standard to apply in the absence of legislation. The problem with the majority’s rule of intent is that application of this inflexible rule will not serve the child’s best interests in every case.

I express no view on whether the best interests of the child in this case will be served by determining that the genetic mother is or is not the natural mother under California’s Uniform Parentage Act. It may be that in this case the child’s interests will be best served by recognizing Crispina as the natural mother. But this court is not just making a rule to resolve this case. Because the UPA does not adequately address the situation of gestational surrogacy, this court is of necessity making a rule that, unless new legislation is enacted, will govern all fliture cases of gestational surrogacy in California. And all future cases will not be alike. The genetic mother and her spouse may be, in most cases, considerably more affluent than the gestational mother. But “[t]he mere fact that a couple is willing to pay a good deal of money to obtain a child does not vouchsafe that they will be suitable parents . . . .” (Capron & Radin, Choosing Family Law Over Contract Law as a Paradigm for Surrogate Motherhood, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at pp. 65-66.) It requires little imagination to foresee cases in which the genetic mothers are, for example, unstable or substance abusers, or in which the genetic mothers’ life circumstances change dramatically during the gestational mothers’ pregnancies, while the gestational mothers, though of a less advantaged socioeconomic class, are stable, mature, capable and willing to provide a loving family environment in which the child will flourish. Under those circumstances, the majority’s rigid reliance on the intent of the genetic mother will not serve the best interests of the child.

VIII. The Best Interests of the Child

As I have discussed, in California the existing statutory law applicable to this case is the Uniform Parentage Act which was never designed to govern the new reproductive technology of gestational surrogacy. Under the UPA, both the genetic mother and the gestational mother have an equal right to be the child’s natural mother. But the UPA allows one natural mother for each child, and thus this court is required to make a choice. To break this “tie” between the genetic mother and the gestational mother, the majority uses the legal concept of intent. In so doing, the majority has articulated a rationale for using the concept of intent that is grounded in principles of tort, intellectual property and commercial contract law.

But, as I have pointed out, we are not deciding a case involving the commission of a tort, the ownership of intellectual property, or the delivery of goods under a commercial contract; we are deciding the fate of a child. In *119the absence of legislation that is designed to address the unique problems of gestational surrogacy, this court should look not to tort, property or contract law, but to family law, as the governing paradigm and source of a rule of decision.

The allocation of parental rights and responsibilities necessarily impacts the welfare of a minor child. And in issues of child welfare, the standard that courts frequently apply is the best interests of the child. (See §§ 222.20, 222.36, 224.64 [matters relating to adoption and temporary placement], 4600 [child custody], 4601 [visitation].) Indeed, it is highly significant that the UPA itself looks to a child’s best interests in deciding another question of parental rights. (§ 7017, subd. (d)(2).) This “best interests” standard serves to assure that in the judicial resolution of disputes affecting a child’s well-being, protection of the minor child is the foremost consideration. Consequently, I would apply “the best interests of the child” standard to determine who can best assume the social and legal responsibilities of motherhood for a child born of a gestational surrogacy arrangement.4

The determination of a child’s best interests does not depend on the parties’ relative economic circumstances, which in a gestational surrogacy situation will usually favor the genetic mother and her spouse. (See Matter of Baby M., supra, 537 A.2d at p. 1249.) As this court has recognized, however, superior wealth does not necessarily equate with good parenting. (See Burchard v. Garay (1986) 42 Cal.3d 531, 540 [229 Cal.Rptr. 800, 724 P.2d 486, 62 A.L.R.4th 237].)

*120Factors that are pertinent to good parenting, and thus that are in a child’s best interests, include the ability to nurture the child physically and psychologically (Cahill, The Ethics of Surrogate Motherhood: Biology, Freedom, and Moral Obligation, in Surrogate Motherhood, supra, at p. 160), and to provide ethical and intellectual guidance (see In re Marriage of Carney (1979) 24 Cal.3d 725, 739 [157 Cal.Rptr. 383, 598 P.2d 36, 3 A.L.R.4th 1028]). Also crucial to a child’s best interests is the “well recognized right” of every child ‘to stability and continuity.” (Burchard v. Garay, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 546 (cone. opn. of Mosk, J.).) The intent of the genetic mother to procreate a child is certainly relevant to the question of the child’s best interests; alone, however, it should not be dispositive.

Here, the child born of the gestational surrogacy arrangement between Anna Johnson and Mark and Crispina Calvert has lived continuously with Mark and Crispina since his birth in September 1990. The trial court awarded parental rights to Mark and Crispina, concluding that as a matter of law they were the child’s “genetic, biological and natural” parents.5 In reaching that conclusion, the trial court did not treat Anna’s statutory claim to be the child’s legal mother as equal to Crispina’s, nor did the trial court consider the child’s best interests in deciding between those two equal statutory claims. Accordingly, I would remand the matter to the trial court to undertake that evaluation.

Conclusion

Recent advances in medical technology have made it possible for the human female reproductive role to be divided between two women, the genetic mother and the gestational mother. Such gestational surrogacy arrangements call for sensitivity to each of the adult participants. But the paramount concern must be the well-being of the child that gestational surrogacy has made possible.

The model legislation proposed by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform Laws would protect such children’s well-being by precisely defining their parentage. Such precision is not possible using a “best interests of the child” standard, which requires a case-by-case evaluation after the birth of the child. But that evaluation would afford many protections similar to those set out in USCACA, such as judicial oversight, legal counsel, and an opportunity for the court to determine who best can provide for the child.

I recognize that, for couples such as Mark and Crispina, gestational surrogacy offers the only hope of raising a child who is genetically related to *121both. But the desire for a genetically related child does not diminish the substantial concerns expressed by a broad spectrum of commentators that surrogacy left unregulated poses a fundamental threat to the well-being of women and children. This threat could largely be allayed by legislation permitting gestational surrogacy, but under court supervision and with the type of procedural requirements proposed in the USCACA that serve to protect all of those affected by a gestational surrogacy arrangement, particularly the child. In my view, the Legislature should turn its attention to the complex issues posed by gestational surrogacy.

In this opinion, I do not purport to offer a perfect solution to the difficult questions posed by gestational surrogacy; perhaps there can be no perfect solution. But in the absence of legislation specifically designed to address the complex issues of gestational surrogacy and to protect against potential abuses, I cannot join the majority’s uncritical validation of gestational surrogacy.

I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal, and remand the case to the trial court for a determination of disputed parentage on the basis of the best interests of the child.