Opinion ID: 2831329
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Additional Response to the Dissent

Text: The dissent claims that the Court’s holding compels trial courts to disregard the fundamental public policies of protecting children from harm and acting in their best interests. ___ S.W.3d at ___. Nothing could be further from the truth. Rather, we are respecting the Legislature’s wellsupported policy determination, reflected in the plain language of the MSA statute, that courts should defer to the parties’ determinations regarding the best interest of their children when those decisions are made in the context of a statutorily compliant MSA. As discussed above, the harmful effects of litigation in family disputes are well-documented, leading the Legislature to vigorously promote the avoidance of such litigation. This is particularly so when the parties reach agreement pursuant to the mediation process, which is itself designed to ensure that children are protected. The dissent engages in a tortured reading of the MSA statute, flouts well-settled principles of statutory interpretation, and ignores the ramifications of discouraging mediation. And it does so unnecessarily, as our children’s welfare can, and indeed must, be protected at the same time that the mediation process and its benefits are preserved. We agree with the dissent that “[s]urely the Legislature did not commit a useless act in enacting each of more than one hundred statutory provisions to assist courts in determining how and when to consider a child’s best interest.” ___ S.W.3d at ___.20 But the Legislature’s explicit direction to courts to make best interest determinations in so many other provisions reinforces our 20 W e recognize the serious policy reasons underlying the Family Code’s numerous references to a child’s best interest and agree that a child’s best interest should always be the paramount concern when adjudicating custody and access issues. W e simply disagree about whether the statute requires courts to defer to parents’ decisions about such matters within the context of properly executed MSAs. 22 interpretation of section 153.0071, rather than the dissent’s, and highlights the particular policy considerations, discussed at length above, underlying enforcement of statutorily compliant MSAs. The dissent erroneously concludes that those provisions support grafting similar language onto section 153.0071, even though the Legislature chose not to include it. For example, the dissent reads subsection (e-1), the family violence exception, “to allow a trial court to consider the terms of a modification when the presumption that MSA parties act in the best interest of the child has been negated.” Id. at ___. But the exception is not nearly as broad as the dissent suggests. Instead, the Legislature carefully identified the specific circumstance in which a trial court may override the parties’ best interest determinations and decline to enter judgment on an MSA: when a party to the MSA is a victim of family violence, and the family violence impaired the party’s ability to make decisions.21 TEX . FAM . CODE § 153.0071(e-1). The dissent’s insistence that “nothing in the statute expressly limits a trial court’s authority to decline to enter judgment on a properly executed, binding MSA to the family violence context addressed in section 153.0071(e-1)” raises the question: why include the exception at all? See ___ S.W.3d at ___. The dissent dismisses our concern that allowing statutorily compliant MSAs to be set aside on best interest grounds will interfere with the state policy favoring peaceable resolution of family disputes and will discourage parties from engaging in mediation. Id. at ___. We disagree, as 21 The dissent aptly notes that “[h]ad the Legislature used ‘or’ instead of ‘and’ between the two parts of that family violence provision, a trial court would be able to reject an M SA simply because a parent was induced by family violence to enter into an MSA.” ___ S.W .3d at ___. By the same token, had the Legislature used “or” instead of “and” between the two parts of the provision, a trial court would be able to reject an M SA solely because the court concluded it was not in a child’s best interest. But the Legislature did use the word “and,” and the trial court cannot reject an MSA without making affirmative findings as to both parts. 23 (apparently) did the Legislature in failing to include a best interest determination as a prerequisite for or barrier to entry of judgment on an MSA. Why would parties spend considerable time, effort, and money to mediate their dispute in accordance with the statutory requirements when the trial court could very well decide to hold a full trial on the merits anyway? The dissent’s claim that this will happen only in rare cases simply is not supportable. To that end, a trial court’s determination that an MSA is not in a child’s best interest is not dependent upon, or equivalent to, a finding that the child has been harmed by abuse or neglect or is in danger of such harm. Rather, “best interest” is a term of art encompassing a much broader, factsand-circumstances based evaluation that is accorded significant discretion. See Holley v. Adams, 544 S.W.2d 367, 371–72 (Tex. 1976) (identifying nine factors that may be considered in determining best interest).22 Under the dissent’s interpretation, the trial court would thus have significant leeway, in contravention of the statute’s intent, to decide when entry of judgment on a statutorily compliant MSA is or is not appropriate. The possibility that this would lead to an increase in child-related litigation is very real, as parents would be encouraged to contest on best interest grounds the very agreements that they freely entered into through mediation.23 Even more concerning, parents would 22 Those factors are: (1) the desires of the child; (2) the emotional and physical needs of the child now and in the future; (3) the emotional and physical danger to the child now and in the future; (4) the parental abilities of the individuals seeking custody; (5) the programs available to assist these individuals to promote the best interest of the child; (6) the plans for the child by these individuals or by the agency seeking custody; (7) the stability of the home or proposed placement; (8) the acts or omissions of the parent which may indicate that the existing parent-child relationship is not a proper one; and (9) any excuse for the acts or omissions of the parent. Holley, 544 S.W .2d at 372. 23 The dissent insists that it is not reading section 153.0071 to allow a trial court to “refuse to enter judgment on an MSA based on any one of the [Holley] factors” and that the issue presented here is “whether a trial court has discretion to reject an MSA that the trial court determines, based on evidence, places a child’s safety and welfare in danger and, consequently, cannot possibly be in the child’s best interest.” ___ S.W .3d at ___. But again, the trial court made no endangerment findings, stating only that the MSA “is not in the best interest of the child[].” More importantly, 24 be discouraged from using the mediation process to begin with, out of concern that their agreements could be ignored and their efforts wasted. Ultimately, the dissent’s suggestion that enforcing section 153.0071 as written leads to an absurd result falls flat. If it were indeed the case that our interpretation would leave trial courts with no ability to protect a child from an MSA that put a child’s welfare at risk, we would agree with that suggestion. But as discussed at length above, that simply is not the case, as trial courts have numerous tools at their disposal to protect children that operate in conjunction with, rather than in opposition to, the mandate in section 153.0071.24