Court Opinion

ID: 9568105
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:00:40.965358+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:24:21.077164
License: Public Domain

*145Seinfeld, J.
(dissenting) — I respectfully dissent. Because Craig Swanson, C’s presumed father, failed to make any showing that disestablishment was in C’s best interest, the trial court did not err in dismissing this case Generally, "a man alleged . . . to be the father . . . may bring an action at any time for the purpose of declaring the . . . nonexistence of the father and child relationship.” RCW 26.26.060(l)(a). But RCW 26.26.060(1)0») provides that a presumed father may bring such an action "only if the action is brought within a reasonable time after obtaining knowledge of relevant facts.”
By imposing a "reasonable time” requirement, the Legislature has recognized that a presumed father’s untimely effort to disestablish his relationship with his child generally is not in the child’s best interest. There are detrimental consequences — financial, social, and psychological — associated with the probing involved in a disestablishment action and there are repercussions attached to a declaration of illegitimacy. See Pierson v. Pier-*146son, 124 Wash. 319, 321, 214 P. 159 (1923) ("A court will not by its judgment brand an innocent child with the bar sinister unless the record is so far conclusive as to leave room for no other course.”)56
The difficult question before this court is how to reconcile the competing policies supporting the presumption that a child born during wedlock is a child of the marriage and the general assumption that it is in a child’s best interest to know the identity of its biological father. As the majority agrees, RCW 26.26.060(l)(b) suggests that the trial court is not required to subject a child to a guardian’s investigation unless the dilatory presumptive father first makes a threshold showing that the action is in the child’s best interest.
Nothing in the record here indicates that Craig’s diss-*147establishment action would aid C in knowing who her biological father is or benefit her in any way. Further, as Craig argues in his appellate briefs, he initially even opposed the appointment of a guardian, contending that there was no need for one. (Opening Br. at 6; Reply Br. at 16; RP at 4:8-9 (May 21, 1993)) Craig was correct; absent a prima facie showing of best interest, a guardian was not necessary.
Nonetheless, once appointed, the guardian did not, as the majority states, "fail[ ] to investigate and assess C’s best interests.” Rather, he saw his role as exploring all issues. But his comments to the trial court indicate a sensitivity to the financial burden of a full social investigation and an effort to avoid incurring unnecessary expenses.
Midway through the investigation, the trial court determined that it was possible to decide the case as a matter of law without a complete guardian’s report. Under the facts of this case, I believe the trial court had the discretion to make this decision. As the majority acknowledges, "the trial court must appoint a guardian only when the movant, by affidavit or otherwise, makes an appropriate threshold showing.” I see no logical reason to grant the trial court discretion to decline to appoint a guardian initially, but to deny it the discretion to terminate the services of a guardian who was appointed without a threshold showing that the appointment was in the child’s best interest. I believe the majority’s opinion unnecessarily limits trial court discretion and does a disservice to the parties.
Further, relying upon the rubric, "child’s best interest,” the majority would disregard the timeliness conditions set forth in RCW 26.26.060(l)(b). Of even greater concern, it would require the trial court to act in a way that is likely to be contrary to the child’s best interest. The majority’s remand will subject C to the guardian’s probing questions that by themselves can cause irreversible damage to a child’s life.
*148Finally, the facts in the cases cited by the majority are distinguishable. We do not have two men competing to be the father as in McDaniels v. Carlson, 108 Wn.2d 299, 738 P.2d 254 (1987), and we do not have a putative father who had an affair with a married woman as in State v. Santos, 104 Wn.2d 142, 702 P.2d 1179, 70 A.L.R.4th 1021 (1985). Nor do we have an alleged father as in State ex rel. Campbell v. Cook, 86 Wn. App. 761, 938 P.2d 345 (1997). Nor would Craig’s success in disestablishing paternity produce an accurate determination of paternity for C. It would merely remove from C the only father she has ever known. These are the facts suggested by the McDaniels court when it acknowledged that "in some circumstances a child’s interest will be even better served by no paternity determination at all.” 108 Wn.2d at 310.
In sum, under the facts of this case, Craig’s biological evidence of nonpaternity should not be sufficient to challenge the presumption of legal paternity. In light of the State’s interest in preserving the father-child relationship of a child born during wedlock and of Craig’s voluntary acceptance of the parental role for almost 10 years, he should not now be allowed to disclaim C, leaving her fatherless, financially and emotionally. For the above reasons, I would affirm the trial court’s order of dismissal.
Review denied at 134 Wn.2d 1004 (1998).

 The United States Supreme Court traced the historic policies underlying the presumption of parentage in Michael H. v. Gerald D., 491 U.S. 110, 124-25, 109 S. Ct. 2333, 105 L. Ed. 2d 91 (1989):
The presumption of legitimacy was a fundamental principle of the common law. H. Nicholas, Adulturine Bastardy 1 (1836). Traditionally, that presumption could be rebutted only by proof that a husband was incapable of procreation or had had no access to his wife during the relevant period. Id., at 9-10 (citing Bracton, De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliae, bk. i, ch. 9, p. 6; bk. ii, ch. 29, p. 63, ch. 32, p. 70 (1569)). As explained by Blackstone, nonaccess could only be proved "if the husband be out of the kingdom of England (or, as the law somewhat loosely phrases it, extra quatuor maria [beyond the four seas] ) for above nine months, ...” 1 Blackstone’s Commentaries 456 (J. Chitty ed. 1826). And, under the common law both in England and here, "neither husband nor wife [could] be a witness to prove access or nonaccess.” J. Schouler, Law of the Domestic Relations § 225, p. 306 (3d ed. 1882); R. Graveson & F. Crane, A Century of Family Law: 1857-1957, p. 158 (1957). The primary policy rationale underlying the common law’s severe restrictions on rebuttal of the presumption appears to have been an aversion to declaring children illegitimate, see Schouler, supra, § 225, at 306-307; M. Grossberg, Governing the Hearth 201 (1985), thereby depriving them of rights of inheritance and succession, 2 J. Kent, Commentaries on American Law 175, and likely making them wards of the state. A secondary policy concern was the interest in promoting the "peace and tranquillity of States and families,” Schouler, supra, § 225, at 304, quoting Boullenois, Traite des Status, bk. 1, p. 62, a goal that is obviously impaired by facilitating suits against husband and wife asserting that their children are illegitimate. Even though, as bastardy laws became less harsh, "[j]udges in both [England and the United States] gradually widened the acceptable range of evidence that could be offered by spouses, and placed restraints on the 'four seas rule’...[,] the law retained a strong bias against ruling the children of married women illegitimate.” Grosberg, supra, at 202.