Opinion ID: 2452405
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Family Code Carried Forward the Duty To Support Incompetent Children

Text: The majority has found on the face of section 14.05 [1] an intent on the part of the legislature to change the meaning of the continuing duty spelled out by article 4639a-1. [2] The difference, notes the majority, is that article 4639a-1 imposed the duty of support for an incompetent child whether a minor or not, whereas section 14.05 of the Family Code omitted those words. Indeed, the Code omits those words but imposes the same duty by stating that support may continue after the 18th birthday and for an indefinite period thereafter. With respect, I suggest that the meaning of the words is the same. It is the heavy burden of the majority to show that support required both before age eighteen and after eighteen for an indefinite time means something different from whether a minor or not. The Family Code made two other changes in the prior law showing that the legislature intended to relax the conditions to the award of support by the earlier statute. The Family Code eliminated the requirement in article 4639a-1 for custodial care, by substituting an express provision for entitlement to support after eighteen whether institutionalized or not. The Family Code eliminated the other requirement that the court must act only upon full and satisfactory evidence. One must look hard in the face of these facts to find any legislative intent for the majority's strict construction and retrenchment from the direction of the earlier law. In fact, one must ignore section 3.01 of article 5429b-2 which was the rule of construction intended by the Code Construction Act at the time the Family Code was enacted. That section says: In enacting a statute, it is presumed that: (3) a just and reasonable result is intended; (4) a result feasible of execution is intended; and (5) public interest is favored over any private interest. The majority construes the word child as used in section 14.05 to mean a person less than eighteen. This construction raises more problems than it solves. The holding is inconsistent with the meaning of child as used in section 12.04 which says that the parent of a child has the following rights, privileges, duties and powers: (9) the right to inherit from and through the child.... The majority's construction would deny the right to inherit from one who is more than eighteen. Section 13.21 concerns voluntary legitimation. It begins: (a) If a statement of paternity has been executed by the father of an illegitimate child, the father or mother of the child... may file a petition for a decree designating the father as a parent of the child. The majority to be consistent would say a person beyond eighteen is not a child and the legislature having used the word child did not intend to afford legitimation procedures for one who is beyond eighteen. Section 14.08 of the Family Code authorizes modification of orders concerning a child. Under the majority view, even if the court had ordered Diana's support as an incompetent before she reached age eighteen, the court could not have modified that order after age eighteen because she was no longer a child. The court has extracted a narrow meaning from the word that the legislature nowhere indicates it intended. The majority's construction of article 14.05 is troublesome in other ways. The majority holds that parents must hurry to the divorce court before a child reaches age eighteen because, absent an order before that age, there is nothing to continue. Children must develop their mental or physical disability before eighteen because if they unfortunately develop the handicap at age nineteen, they do not qualify for help. If a parent amicably agrees to support a child until the child reaches age eighteen, as Mr. Red did, and there is no prior support order which may be continued, the parent supplying the support may stop and the court is left powerless to require future payments. The majority opinion suggests that Diana has a remedy through section 423, Probate Code. The argument begs the question and is indeed a harsh construction for the denial of relief under the Family Code. Section 423 authorizes repeated suits for debt against a parent who has refused to reimburse the state for its expenses in providing institutional care for an incompetent child. State v. Stone, 271 S.W.2d 741 (Tex.Civ. App.1954, no writ).