Opinion ID: 1610450
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Statutes and Precedent

Text: The reasoning employed by Judge Moore in his dissenting opinion below, and adopted in the main opinion of this Court, is based upon a comparison and juxtaposition of the terms parental rights and parental responsibilities in Ala.Code 1975, § 26-18-7, and the term residual parental rights and responsibilities in Ala. Code 1975, § 12-15-1(24). [8] Such reasoning, as to statutes with essentially identical language, was rejected in Virginia v. Fletcher, 38 Va.App. 107, 110, 562 S.E.2d 327, 328 (2002), on the ground that, by their express terms, such statutes simply do not address the issue before us. I believe the same is true of those terms as used in our statutes. On a fundamental level, rights and obligations go hand in hand. See, e.g., State v. Dyer, 98 N.H. 59, 62, 94 A.2d 718, 720 (1953)(stating, in the context of a criminal proceeding, [t]he notion that one has rights without corresponding duties would destroy our scheme of ordered liberty under law, since real freedom and responsibility must go hand in hand. To separate them is to destroy both.); see also, e.g., Usdin v. State Dep't of Envtl. Prot., 173 N.J.Super. 311, 329, 414 A.2d 280, 289 (1980)(environmental-law dispute) (Perhaps it is trite, but nevertheless true: rights and responsibilities must go hand in hand.). So far as termination-of-parental-rights proceedings are concerned, parental rights and obligations are no different. [9] E.g., Ex parte Brooks, 513 So.2d 614, 617 (1987) (We hold that the judgment of the District Court of Jefferson County was correct in concluding that David Carlton Stephenson's best interestsparticularly his right to receive support from his fatherwould not be protected by termination of the father's parental rights.), overruled on other grounds, Ex parte Beasley, 564 So.2d 950 (Ala.1990); Beasnett v. Arledge, 934 So.2d 345, 348 (Miss. Ct.App.2006) ([I]t is an inherent aspect of voluntary termination of parental rights that, just as the entire parent-child relationship terminates, so too does the responsibility to pay child support, so long as the best interests of the child are preserved.); Coffey v. Vasquez, 290 S.C. 348, 350, 350 S.E.2d 396, 398 (1986)([A] parent's obligation to feed, clothe and otherwise support a child, being correlative to the parent's rights in and to the child, does not exist where the parent's reciprocal rights in and to the child have been terminated.); Virginia v. Fletcher, 38 Va.App. 107, 112, 562 S.E.2d 327, 329 (2002) (describing a parent whose parental rights have been terminated as a legal stranger to the child who has no obligation to pay child support). Thus, absent some specific legislative statement to the contrary, the main opinion's reliance on the use of the phrase termination of parental rights as being noninclusive of parental obligations, is misplaced. As noted, Alabama statutes contain no specific statement to the contrary. [10] This is not to say that the Alabama Legislature has not made any statement regarding this matter. The provisions of the Alabama Uniform Parentage Act that were in effect at all times pertinent to the present case provide that [a]s used in this chapter, the term ` parent and child relationship ' shall mean the legal relationship existing between a child and his natural or adoptive parents incident to which the law confers or imposes rights, privileges, duties and obligations.  Ala.Code 1975, § 26-17-2 (superseded, effective January 1, 2009, by Ala.Code 1975, § 26-17-101 et seq.). The recent amendments and commentary to the Alabama Uniform Parentage Act, Ala.Code 1975, § 26-17-101 et seq., are even more enlightening:  Unless parental rights are terminated, a parent-child relationship established under this chapter applies for all purposes, except as otherwise specifically provided by other law of this state. Ala.Code 1975, § 26-17-203 (emphasis added). As the commentary to § 26-17-203 states: This section may seem to state the obvious, but both the statement and the qualifier are necessary because without this explanation a literal reading of §§ 201-203 [of the Uniform Parentage Act (2002)] could lead to erroneous statutory constructions. The basic purpose of the section is to make clear that a mother, as defined in § 201(a), is not a parent once her parental rights have been terminated. Similarly, a man whose paternity has been established by acknowledgment or by court adjudication may subsequently have his parental rights terminated. (Emphasis added.) [11] As the main opinion notes, statutes regarding the same subject matter are to be construed in pari materia. Archer Daniels Midland Co. v. Seven Up Bottling Co. of Jasper, Inc., 746 So.2d 966, 988 (Ala. 1999); see also United States v. Freeman, 44 U.S. 556, (3 How.) 556, 11 L.Ed. 724 (1845) (If it can be gathered from a subsequent statute in pari materia what meaning the legislature attached to the words of the former statute, this will amount to a legislative declaration of its meaning and will govern the construction of the first statute.). Section 26-18-7(a) should be read in pari materia with § 26-17-203. Until the holding of the main opinion in the present case, Alabama appellate courts have consistently stated that the termination of parental rights entails the termination of the parental relationship, including parental obligations such as child support. As this Court stated in Ex parte Brooks , a child's right to receive support from his fatherwould not be protected by termination of the father's parental rights. 513 So.2d at 617. See also, e.g., State Dep't of Human Res. v. I.P., 874 So.2d 1121, 1122 n. 1 (Ala.Civ.App.2003)(citing Brooks in support of the statement that [a]lthough DHR presented ample evidence from which the trial court could have concluded that grounds for the termination of the parents' parental rights existed, see § 26-18-7(a), Ala.Code 1975, the trial court might have concluded, given the unlikelihood of M.P.'s being adopted and the lack of any evidence of a permanent and stable custodial placement, that DHR had not shown it was in M.P.'s best interest to terminate the parents' parental rights, at least not at the present time); C.M. v. D.P., 849 So.2d 963, 966 (Ala.Civ.App.2002) ([A]s in Brooks , it is not in the child's best interests to be alienated from any future right to financial support, parental affiliation, and inheritance.  (emphasis added)); In re Beasley, 564 So.2d 959, 960 (Ala.Civ. App.1990) (stating, on remand from the Supreme Court, Even if the father chooses not to establish contact with his son, the child's right to receive support from his father remains. See, Brooks . Clearly, the child's future right to support, including a possible college education ( see Ex parte Bayliss, 550 So.2d 986 (Ala.1989)), and the child's rights of inheritance would not be protected if the father's parental rights were terminated.  (emphasis added)); Ex parte University of South Alabama, 541 So.2d 535, 538 (Ala.1989) (A child has this fundamental right to financial support until its majority or a legal termination of parental rights.); McDaniel v. Miller, 659 So.2d 640, 642 (Ala.Civ.App.1995) (citing both Beasley and Brooks , and holding that [t]he child's right to current and future support, including, possibly, payment of a college education, and the child's right of inheritance from the father, were apparently never considered, and the child's rights certainly were not protected when the trial court terminated the father's parental rights). The nature and repetition of the statements of our courts over the past 30 years to the effect that a termination of parental rights carries with it the termination of other aspects of the parent-child relationship such as the obligation to pay child support and inheritance is such that it cannot be easily dismissed as mere assumption as suggested by the main opinion. Furthermore, when the legislature adopted the CPA in 1984, the phrase termination of parental rights already had been recognized judicially as including the termination of child-support obligations. In Erwin v. Luna, 443 So.2d 1242 (Ala.Civ. App.1983), the father had entered into an agreement with his former wife in which he consented to the adoption of his child and she attempted to waive his obligation to pay child support. Thereafter, the wife did not proceed with the adoption, and an action was instituted seeking child support from the father. The court first noted that the child's right to receive support could not be waived, even if the waiver was adopted in the court's decree. The court then stated: Only if appellant's parental rights had been terminated, either by adoption or otherwise, would appellant's support obligations have ceased. Id. at 1244 (emphasis added). See also Roe v. Conn, 417 F.Supp. 769, 779 (M.D.Ala.1976) (describing the termination of parental rights under Alabama law as sever[ing] entirely the parent-child relationship). [12] Perhaps more importantly, this Court must take into account that under Erwin the phrase termination of parental rights had a preexisting legal meaning that presumably was known to the legislature when it enacted the CPA in 1984. See City of Pinson v. Utilities Bd. of Oneonta, 986 So.2d 367, 373 (Ala.2007) (`The Legislature is presumed to be aware of existing law and judicial interpretation when it adopts a statute,' Carson v. City of Prichard, 709 So.2d 1199, 1206 (Ala.1998), and `we presume that the legislature does not intend to make any alteration in the law beyond what it explicitly declares.' Ware v. Timmons, 954 So.2d 545, 556 (Ala.2006)(quoting Duncan v. Rudulph, 245 Ala. 175, 176, 16 So.2d 313, 314 (1944)).). Thus, contrary to the main opinion's assumption that the legislature intended for the CPA to provide for the termination of parental rights but not the concurrent termination of parental obligations, we must actually presume the opposite. Further still, as noted above, Ex parte Brooks , In re Beasley , and the other cases relying on Ex parte Brooks , reflect clear pronouncements from our courts that, so far as they were concerned, the phrase termination of parental rights as it was used in the CPA was intended to include the termination of a parent's obligation to pay child support. The main opinion posits that the language at issue in the aforementioned opinions is dicta, which I will hereinafter address, and that the legislature actually intended the opposite. The latter position cannot withstand scrutiny. The legislature has thrice amended the CPA since the decision in Ex parte Brooks , yet it has not chosen to correct the alleged error of construction posited by the main opinion. As noted above, [t]he Legislature, when it enacts legislation, is presumed to have knowledge of existing law and of the judicial construction of existing statutes. Mobile Infirmary Med. Ctr. v. Hodgen, 884 So.2d 801, 814 (Ala.2003). The proper aim of judicial interpretation is to determine the intention of the legislature. We believe it is pertinent to point out that there exists, and has long existed, in this state, a principle that when the legislature readopts a code section, or incorporates it into a subsequent Code, prior decisions of this court permeate the statute, and it is presumed that the legislature deliberately adopted the statute with knowledge of this court's interpretation thereof.  Edgehill Corp. v. Hutchens, 282 Ala. 492, 495-96, 213 So.2d 225, 227-28 (1968); see also Ex parte HealthSouth Corp., 851 So.2d 33, 41-42 (Ala.2002) (Presumably, when the Legislature reenacts or amends a statute without altering language that has been judicially interpreted, it adopts a particular judicial construction.). Thus, regardless of whether Ex parte Brooks and its progeny reflect what the legislature originally intended, this Court must presume that the legislature has now acquiesced in the construction reflected in those decisions.