Transformation of Domestic Family Legislation in the Context of Preserving the Spiritual and Moral Foundations of Marriage and Family

The relevance of the study is due to the value confrontation in which the institution of the family finds itself in the focus of various regulatory models (in the EU and the USA, same-sex marriage and gender-neutral parenting are legally enshrined, which is considered a value challenge by official documents of the Russian Federation, in particular Presidential Decree No. 809), as well as the strategic course of the Russian Federation to preserve and protect traditional spiritual and moral values enshrined in the Constitution of the Russian Federation and strategic planning documents. The main purpose of the article is to identify the patterns of transformation of domestic family legislation from the pre—state period to the present, showing the inextricable link between legal changes and the preservation of the spiritual and moral foundations of marriage and family as a condition for the continuity of generations and ensuring state sovereignty. The issues under consideration cover the evolution of forms of marriage in pre-Christian Russia (abduction, purchase, arranged marriage, military seizure), the influence of Christianity and Byzantine legislation, the formation of written law (Russkaya Pravda, the Cathedral Code), secular transformation in the imperial and Soviet periods, as well as the modern constitutionalization of family values through the legal positions of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation. Methods used: historical-legal, formal-legal, comparative-legal, system-structural analysis, method of interpretation of the legal positions of the body of constitutional justice. Conclusions. The transformation of family legislation in Russia has always maintained the continuity of traditional foundations, even with external institutional changes. The Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation acts as the «guardian of continuity», translating traditional values into the plane of generally binding legal positions.