Joe Stump <joe@joestump.net> writes:
> I was getting an error on the parentID reference because there were no
> records to reference in the first place. Odd.
It should work, because the FK check is an end-of-statement check and
should consider the just-inserted row as available for referencing.
What PG version are you using, and can you show the exact sequence of
operations that produces a failure for you?
regards, tom lane