From: kevin@rotag.mi.org (Kevin Darcy)
Subject: Re: Right To Not Support
Organization: Who, me???
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 20:09:57 GMT

In article <BssHxM.2rB@news.cso.uiuc.edu> slkg9733@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Steven L. Kellmeyer) writes:
>kevin@cfctech.cfc.com (Kevin Darcy) writes:
>
>>In article <BsDw1x.5A5@news.cso.uiuc.edu> slkg9733@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Steven L. Kellmeyer) writes:
>>>vixie@pa.dec.com (Paul A Vixie) writes:
>>>
>>>>slkg9733@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Steven L. Kellmeyer) writes:
>>>
>>>True, but we are assuming the delivery was not coerced.  The man has
>>>delivered raw materials in the same way a truck might deliver steel
>>>to an automobile plant.  Surely, assuming the raw material was of good
>>>quality, the steel company cannot be held liable for the upkeep of
>>>the automobile (or whatever other use the company may decide to make
>>>of that raw material).
>
>>An automobile does not have a right to support, however. Your analogy sucks.
>
>Non sequitor.

That's "non sequitur". If you're going to play with Latin, try to at least
get the spellings right.

>The raw material analogy still holds, since the "right to support"
>can only be compelled from the individual(s) responsible for the creation
>of the child.  

Wrong. The right to support is premised on causal PARTICIPATION in the
creation of a child. Not just the creator, but everyone significantly 
contributing to the creation, can potentially be held liable. This includes 
the father.

>The child's right to support is not in question, nor does 
>the analogy bring it into question.  

The analogy is fatally flawed because you are trying to interpret child 
support as a tort action for the consequences of a child's "manufacture"
when in actual fact it's a statutory obligation relating to the whole process
leading up to the child's "manufacture", i.e. extending all the way back to
the act of sexual intercourse.

>It questions just who has the "duty"
>that the "right" implies.  The duty obviously does not derive from someone
>who clearly supplies nothing more than raw material.  

This is not "obvious", Kellmeyer, as I've been telling you for over a year.
This has nothing to do with warranty or commercial law. There is no legal
distinction between "raw" and "refined" genetic materials. There is no
legally-recognized "manufacturing" process. You're totally out in left field
here. The only thing the law cares about in terms of causality is whether the 
father significantly contributed to the creation of the child. Obviously he 
did. Stop trying to rewrite a well-established legal rationale.

>>>>> [re: Tennessee frozen embryo case]
>>>
>>>Furthermore, he *did* rule that the man had a right "to choose not to be
>>>a father".  This implies a) he is not currently a father (the frozen 
>>>embryos are not children, nor do they create any paternal duties in the
>>>man)  and b) the "father" status would inevitably result (along with
>>>possible child support obligations - that I don't really know) if 
>>>re-implantation were to be allowed.
>
>>Analogy #2 sucks also, since there is the added complication of divorce to
>>be considered. As I understand it, when the "parents" divorced, she retained
>>ownership of the frozen embryos, but the Tennessee court ruled that he still
>>retained some form of ownership control over the DISPOSITION of that 
>>property. There were "strings attached", as it were. So while it might make
>>good propaganda to cite the "can't force a man to become a father" part of
>>the ruling, that was not necessarily the main principle relied on to decide
>>the case, and therefore the case might not be particularly relevant to the 
>>paternity child-support controversy.
>
>I made no analogy in the second part, so I'm not sure what you are referring
>to.  

You are trying to draw an analogy between the frozen embryo case and the state
of the law wrt paternity, are you not?

>However, if the man retained some sort of "control" even AFTER a
>divorce, one would assume that this same control would hold within a marriage.

Yes, but the delineation between his rights and her rights to that property 
would be a lot fuzzier in that case, and unlikely to ever show up in a court
case.

>Again, you are attacking a line of reasoning that is not germane to the 
>central premise.  

Hand-waving. Please prove that the case was decided on anything other than
post-divorce property-disposition rights, and you might have a chance of
making the analogy to paternity stick. Otherwise, I'm liable to just dismiss
the quotes about "right to choose not to be a father" as little more than
irrelevant dicta.

>Those "strings" you speak of only appeared when the 
>embryos were not being held by the woman.  

No. Those "strings" were only CONTESTED after the divorce went through. They
may very well have pre-existed the divorce decree.

								- Kevin