CSE Advocates: The Liar's
Club
September 18, 2002
by Roger F. Gay
The legal definition of insanity is
(roughly) the inability to distinguish right from wrong. It occurs to
me that child support enforcement advocates are building their defense,
anticipating the day when this crude con-game will all come crashing
down around their pointy little heads.
The provocation
for this article includes the cases of John Ruff in Oakland County,
Michigan and Dr. Damon Adams, a dentist in Traverse City.
John's girlfriend told him that he was the father of her daughter and
John decided to "stand up and be a man and take responsibility." Legal
paternity was established and a judge ordered the payment of child support.
Years and $26,000 in child support payments later, long after the relationship
ended, he heard rumors that the child was not his. He decided to get
a DNA test and it turned out that the rumors were true.
John did the obvious thing. He scheduled a hearing in Oakland County
Court and explained the situation to Judge John McDonald, providing
the DNA result as proof. Now at this point, a person who fails the test
proving legal insanity would think it was over. One might even wonder
if John can get his $26,000 back some day.
No, said Crazy Judge McDonald. John must continue to pay child support.
Dr. Damon Adams, a dentist from Traverse City who is pushing for legal
reform understands the problem from firsthand experience. Shortly after
his marriage of 25 years ended, he discovered he did not beget his fourth
child, who was 8 at the time. Adams also presented DNA evidence but
was told that he had to continue paying more than $18,000 a year in
child support.
As if that isn't enough, get a-load of the booby hatch escapees who've
rushed to the press to excuse or in fact support forcing not-the-father's
to pay child support.
The explanation of the cause of the problem deserves serious consideration
for a Liar's Club prize. Not only has it found its way into the newspaper
story linked above, but its an explanation that reached millions of
homes throughout the world through the vehicle of a well-known talk-news
television personality.
According to Christi Goodman, program manager for the National Conference
of State Legislatures; "The current legal system is based on 500 years
of common law that gave children born within a marriage the right to
claim the man in the marriage as their father."
Nice try Ms. Goodman, but the United States hasn't used 500 year old
common law for a long time. I'm sure. Not only was John's not-daughter
not born within a marriage, but child support in the United States has
traditionally been a matter between parents, not a man in the mother's
marriage and her children.
Remember when politicians all over the country were saying, "There's
no excuse for not paying child support." You heard it on TV. The first
working television was invented in 1884 and patented by Paul Nipkow.
The key technical development leading to modern televisions was patented
in 1927 by Philo Farnsworth. In 1934, the British company Gaumont bought
a license from Farnsworth to make systems based on his designs. In 1939,
the American company RCA did the same. So, when you heard it on TV it
had to be less than 500 years ago.
Let me give you a hint. After 200 years of child support law in the
United States, formulated and applied in the shadow of the Constitution,
the federal government got involved in child support collections in
a big way in 1975. They eventually passed laws offering states more
federal funding based on the amount of child support they collect. Apparently,
either not able to pass competency tests or passing the test to establish
legal insanity, states began forcing millions and millions of regular
payers to pay through their system and called everything paid "collections."
That increased the amount of federal funding they received through fraudulent
accounting.
Here's a sampling of federal laws on child support including the years
they have been passed since 1502.
| 1975 |
Social Security Amendments
(PL 93-647). Comprehensive child support legislation that enacted
Title IV-D of the Social Security Act. Officially established
the federal child support enforcement program. |
| 1984 |
Child Support Enforcement
Amendments (PL 98-378). Extended welfare system child support
enforcement practices to include all non-welfare related child
support cases. Made a range of practices mandatory (such as mandatory
income withholding for past-due support payments). Created the
federal incentives system, paying states, and everyone involved
with child support a little something extra for more child support. |
| 1986 |
Bradley Amendment; rule
provides that child support arrearages may not be modified retroactively,
except when paternity is disestablished. |
| 1988 |
Family Support Act (PL
100-485). Required the use of politically defined formulae for
determining the amount of child support ordered. Increased emphasis
on simplified automated enforcement practices and for establishing
paternity. Mandated wage withholding for all support orders, current
and past-due. |
| 1992 |
Child Support Recovery
Act (PL 102-521). Made it a federal crime to fail to pay past-due
child support obligation for a child living in another state.
Uniform Interstate Family Support Act (UIFSA) Model Act. Streamlined
the processing of interstate cases. UIFSA was revised in 1996. |
| 1993 |
Omnibus Budget Reconciliation
Act (OBRA) (PL 103-66). Simplified the paternity establishment
process even further and established medical support provisions
for all children. |
| 1996 |
Personal Responsibility
and Work Opportunities Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) (PL 104-193).
Part of a comprehensive revamping of the welfare system, including
new guidelines for paternity establishment, distribution, collections,
and federal and state automation. Mandated implementation of UIFSA,
federal and state case registries, and the $4.5 billion national
New Hire Directory for tracking financial information of all US
residents and their families. |
| 1998 |
Child Support Performance
and Incentive Act. Made several changes to the child support enforcement
program. It altered the federal government’s method for awarding
incentive payments to states, but not by much. Deadbeat Parents
Punishment Act. Provided for federal felony penalties for egregious
failure to pay child support. |
| 2002 |
H.R. 4737, the "Personal
Responsibility, Work, and Family Promotion Act of 2002" Expands
passport denial program, increases federal administrative offset
funding, requires periodic update of child support orders, increases
tax interceptions, funds additional technical projects, and charges
fees for the pleasure of being victimized the the child support
system. |
I'm calling now for a show of hands. How many of you believe that 500
year old common law is the basis of the child support decisions discussed
above? Just as I thought. I don't see any hands raised.
Not had enough yet? I have. But there is no end to child support advocacy.
There is more. Legislators in Michigan and other states introduced laws
to give men like John Ruff and Damon Adams a break. But there are people
who defend the status quo.
Last year, the Michigan House passed a package of bills that would permit
people to get out of paying child support when a child is not biologically
theirs. The bills also permit the cancellation of child support arrearages
in such cases and penalize mothers who fraudulently say a man fathered
their baby.
The bills sat in the state Senate Committee on Families, Mental Health
and Human Services until they died a natural death. Chairwoman Senator
Beverly Hammerstrom's staff explains that it's mostly because of legal
concerns. Funny how passing laws can be like that.
Amy Zaagman, chief of staff for Senator Hammerstrom, says Hammerstrom
is not really against the idea, it's just that when paternity is established,
men give up their rights. And the bill, which is on discontinuing child
support. One major "legal problem" she found is that the bills do not
stop men from seeing children they have established a bond with. Obviously
men should pay to see children.
"Where is the best interest of the children in all this?" said Zaagman.
"Here's someone who had a relationship with the child, established some
responsibility for the child . . . yet now he doesn't want to be responsible
anymore but wants parenting time? How does that benefit the child?"
Well, there's one more person who passes the test.
Meri Anne Stowe, Chairwoman of the the Family Law Section of the State
Bar of Michigan is opposed to changing the law. She says she can sympathize
with men who are married and later discover a child is not biologically
theirs. Isn't that nice? But Stowe said she is even more concerned about
the children in these cases. "We don't want to illegitimize a whole class
of children, and we don't want to impoverish a whole class of children,"
Stowe said. "We have to look at the greater good."
I have an idea. Back when I was in early manhood, the military draft system
was sending men off to Vietnam. Not everyone was called. A lottery was
held and you got called if your number was low enough. If you are unable
to get away with pleading legal insanity, you are likely intelligent enough
to understand the suggestion. I don't want to explain it clearly for fear
that the others might make it into law.
Roger
F. Gay
Roger
F. Gay is a
professional analyst and director of Project
for the Improvement of Child Support Litigation Technology.
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