Tuesday, October 15, 2002
Michigan lawmaker calls for change in paternity laws
A story published today by the Washington Post reports that Michigan resident, Edward Mack was floored to learn just weeks after his divorce that two of the three children born during his 10-year marriage were fathered by another man. He was even more shocked that the discovery — under Michigan law — meant nothing. A year later, he still pays $375 a month in child support for all three children.
"I don't think it's fair for me to have to take care of somebody else's children when she went out and slept with another man," said Mack, 55, pastor of the Spiritual Israel Church & Its Army Temple No. 8 in Detroit. "I still love the children, because it's not their fault. But think about how you would feel."
In Michigan, as in most other states, the children born during a marriage are the legal responsibility of the husband. And even for single men, once paternity is acknowledged or established through the courts, it is next to impossible to change.
But across the country, including in the Michigan legislature, a push is under way to institute "paternity fraud" laws. The new legislation would cancel mandated child-support payments for men who can prove through DNA testing that they are supporting children who are not their flesh and blood. In some cases, the laws would provide criminal penalties for women who lie about the father of their children.
"It's a legal fraud," said state Rep. James Koetje, a Republican, who is sponsoring the legislation that has passed overwhelmingly in Michigan's House of Representatives. "The state should not condone or perpetuate a legal fiction."
At least 30 states have laws presuming that a child born to a married couple is the man's. He can challenge that presumption in court, but most states have a statute of limitations. The basis of most state law on the presumption of fatherhood is a 500-year-old doctrine in English common law designed to spare children in medieval England from being labeled as illegitimate, and therefore endowed with virtually no rights.
But as part of welfare-reform efforts, states have cracked down on "deadbeat dads," forcing single women to name the fathers of their children so that taxpayers aren't left to pay for child support.
"At some point there is a societal need for the paternity of a child to be established with some degree of certainty," said Christi Goodman, program manager of the children and families program for the National Conference of State Legislatures. "If a man has held a child for three years as his own, he has to say that, 'Even if he's not actually my kid, I've loved and supported him for three years, and at this point he is my son even if he's not my biological child. "
The Michigan Federation for Children and Families has argued that the proposed legislation would make adoptions more difficult because it adds an additional layer of uncertainty if paternity cannot be established with some finality. Child support officials worry it would upend efforts to collect legitimate child support. And the State Bar of Michigan said the state would do more harm than good by passing the bill.
