Court Opinion

ID: 9855647
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:28:42.801936+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:36:17.093748
License: Public Domain

*121F. X. O’Brien, J.
(concurring). I reject plaintiffs contention that he is entitled to recoup support payments made to the Department of Social Services.
I agree with my colleagues that an ex-husband who can prove by clear and convincing evidence that he is not the father of a child he is obligated to support is entitled to prospective termination of that obligation. GCR 1963, 528.3(5).
I further agree that Serafin v Serafin, 401 Mich 629; 258 NW2d 461 (1977), should not be given retroactive application due to reliance on the old rule and the impact on the administration of justice. In this regard I would add that Lord Mansfield’s Rule was an evidentiary rule founded in policy. In Michigan, the considerations underlying the rule were that it lessened the number of public charges and contributed to both familial and societal peace. In re Wright’s Estate, 237 Mich 375, 381; 211 NW 746 (1927). Serafin simply acknowledges that these policy considerations no longer prevail, that the rule has outlived its original policy bases. Serafin, supra, 634. Those bases were temporal and mutable. A change in a rule that is based solely in policy does not alter the rule’s historical applicability. The change merely recognizes contemporary facts and should therefore be prospectively applied.