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10 

TURNER v. ROGERS 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

Mathews  v.  Eldridge  balancing  test  here.    424  U. S.  319 
(1976).  That  test  weighs  an  individual’s  interest  against 
that of the Government.  Id., at 335 (identifying the oppos-
ing interest as “the Government’s interest”); Lassiter, 452 
U. S., at 27 (same).  It does not account for the interests of 
the  child  and  custodial  parent,  who  is  usually  the  child’s
mother.  But  their  interests  are  the  very  reason  for  the 
child  support  obligation  and  the  civil  contempt  proceed-
ings that enforce it.

When  fathers  fail  in  their  duty  to  pay  child  support,
children  suffer.  See  Cancian,  Meyer,  &  Han,  Child  Sup-
port:  Responsible  Fatherhood  and  the  Quid  Pro  Quo,  635 
Annals Am. Acad. Pol. & Soc. Sci. 140, 153 (2011) (finding 
that  child  support  plays  an  important  role  in  reducing
child  poverty  in  single-parent  homes);  cf.  Sorensen  &
Zibman,  Getting  to  Know  Poor  Fathers  Who  Do  Not  Pay 
Child Support, 75 Soc. Serv. Rev. 420, 423 (2001) (finding 
that children whose fathers reside apart from them are 54 
percent  more  likely  to  live  in  poverty  than  their  fathers). 
Nonpayment  or  inadequate  payment  can  press  children
and  mothers  into  poverty.  M.  Garrison,  The  Goals  and 
Limits of Child Support Policy, in Child Support: The Next 
Frontier  16  (J.  Oldham  &  M.  Melli  eds.  2000);  see  also
Dept.  of  Commerce,  Census  Bureau,  T.  Grall,  Custodial
Mothers  and  Fathers  and  Their  Child  Support:  2007,  pp.
4–5  (2009)  (hereinafter  Custodial  Mothers  and  Fathers) 
(reporting  that  27  percent  of  custodial  mothers  lived  in
poverty in 2007). 

The  interests  of  children  and  mothers  who  depend  on
child support are notoriously difficult to protect.  See, e.g., 
Hicks  v.  Feiock,  485  U. S.  624,  644  (1988)  (O’Connor,  J.,
dissenting) (“The failure of enforcement efforts in this area
has become a national scandal” (internal quotation marks
omitted)).  Less  than  half  of  all  custodial  parents  receive
the  full  amount  of  child  support  ordered;  24  percent
of  those  owed  support  receive  nothing  at  all.    Custodial