Court Opinion

ID: 9766995
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 05:05:45.185869+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:25.957997
License: Public Domain

*623ORTH, Judge,
dissenting.
Donald A. Sininger, the father of Jannette Sininger, presents this question for review on his appeal from the judgment entered by the Circuit Court for Montgomery County:
Whether a parent has a civil duty enforceable by the court of equity to support his once emancipated, adult daughter who after attaining the age of majority experiences mental disability?
The majority answer this question by holding that
a parent who has the means to do so, has a duty to support an incapacitated child whose disability commenced after she attained the age of majority.
In concluding that “the parental duty to support an adult incapacitated child existed in this case regardless of the child’s emancipation,” the majority provide a classic example of judicial legislation in the guise of judicial interpretation. The Court’s usurpation of the Legislature’s function leads to a holding which is without support in law or practicality. The holding strains to reach a result; it is case oriented rather than law oriented. This is apparent from the majority’s confession that “[i]n the instant case we are concerned with the plight of Jannette Sininger.” While the concern is commendable, the majority holding reflects what they feel the law should be rather than what it actually is. The majority close their eyes to practical applications of their holding beyond this case. For example, assume a 66 year old father and a 45 year old son. The father worked hard and faithfully until he retired at the age of 65. Being thrifty and conservative in his life-style, he had saved enough to spend his remaining years in relative comfort. The father had supported his son, a ne’er-do-well even as a minor, until the child attained the age of majority, at which time the son fled the home and embarked on a life of crime. In and out of jail thereafter, and a thoroughly dissolute character, at age 45 he drove his car into a tree, and as a result of the injuries he suffered he was paralyzed. He had *624not seen or attempted to get in touch with his father for over 20 years, and, in fact had evidenced no concern whatsoever about his father’s welfare. Now, destitute of means and unable to support himself by reason of his physical infirmity, he calls upon his father to support him. Under the majority’s holding, the father has the duty to do so, and if he fails in that duty he is liable criminally and civilly. The father would also, in all likelihood, be responsible to third parties who furnished the son with necessaries. I cannot conceive that such a result was contemplated by the Legislature. The majority characterize this hypothetical as extreme and emotional. They declare that they “prefer to await an actual case and decide it, and distinguish it, if appropriate, at that time.” It is true that my hypothetical invokes none of the sympathy or concern present with respect to the unfortunate woman in the instant case. But the holding of the majority permits no distinction. By the majority’s rule a parent, for as long as he shall live, faces the possibility that he will have the legal duty to support his adult child thrust upon him, regardless of the child’s prior independence. The duty of care and support, invoked upon the birth of the child is not only active during the child’s minority, but remains dormant thereafter so long as the parent and the child are alive. The duty is awakened, with no further ado, at any time the child becomes incapacitated. In the words of Mr. Bumble, “If the law supposes that, the law is a ass, a idiot.” This Court has recognized that “[o]ne of the well understood canons for the construction of statutes is that courts should avoid absurd consequences.” In Re Special Investigation No. 281, 299 Md. 181, 200, 473 A.2d 1 (1984). To me, the holding of the majority results in absurd consequences, and I cannot accept it.
Before I explain why I think that the law is not what the majority would have it be, I note that the majority found no need to address the mother’s contention on cross-appeal that the circuit court was clearly erroneous in finding that Jannette was not disabled until after she reached the age of *625majority.1 The majority say: “The distinction between when the onset of the illness occurs and when the illness becomes disabling is irrelevant under our holding.” For reasons which will be apparent infra, I find it necessary to address the contention. The Domestic Relations Master who conducted the plenary hearing on the petition found from the evidence before him that Jannette was not disabled at the time she attained the age of majority. The equity court accepted this determination. It said: “[Tjhere is sufficient credible evidence to support the Master’s finding that she was not in fact disabled at the time she attained the age of 21 years.” From the findings of fact on the evidence adduced as set out in the Master’s report I am in full agreement with the Chancellor that there was credible evidence to support the Master’s finding. Therefore, the court was not clearly erroneous in that judgment. Md.Rule 886.
The majority state that what they have held to be the parental duty “is enforceable under the general equity jurisdiction of the circuit court under section 3-602(a) of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article, Maryland Code” (1974, 1984 RepLYol.). The opinions of this Court have time and again made perfectly clear that the statutory declaration set out in this section—“[a] court of equity has jurisdiction over the ... support of a child”—applies only to minor children. This Court said in Price v. Price, 232 Md. 379, 384, 194 A.2d 99 (1963) that the statute is “declaratory of the inherent power of equity over minors.... ” (Emphasis supplied). The statute was referred to as concerning minors as recently as Stancill v. Stancill, 286 Md. 530, 533-534, 408 A.2d 1030 (1979). See in addition to the cases cited therein, Taylor v. Taylor, 246 Md. 616, 619, 229 A.2d 131 (1967) and Coleman v. Coleman, 228 Md. 610, 613, 180 *626A.2d 875 (1962), and the cases cited in those opinions. The majority say that “if the term ‘child’ has been statutorily enlarged it may include more than persons under the age of majority.” They then assert that because they will hold now that a parent has a duty to support an incapacitated adult child, the word “child” has been statutorily enlarged and is within the ambit of § 3-602(a). I do not believe that the term “child” has been statutorily enlarged to encompass an incapacitated adult child, and even if the parental duty is as the majority hold it to be, the enforceability of that duty will have to be on some authority other than § 3-602(a).
The majority expressly look to Maryland Code (1957, 1982 Repl.Vol.) Art. 27, § 97, as applied in Smith v. Smith, 227 Md. 355, 176 A.2d 862 (1962), to support their holding. What spurred the enactment of this statute is readily apparent.
“There was no common law obligation to support adult, incompetent children; neither was there any to support infant children____” Borchert v. Borchert, 185 Md. 586, 590, 45 A.2d 463 (1946). The Poor Relief Act of 43 Eliz. Ch. 2 required the father and the mother, among other relatives, of every poor, old, blind, lame, and impotent person, or other poor person unable to work, to relieve and maintain such person at their own charges, if they were of sufficient ability to do so. Annot., 1. A.L.R.2d 910, 935 (1948). Sir William Blackstone, Knt., stated that
[N]o person is bound to provide a maintenance for his issue unless where the children are impotent and unable to work, either through infancy, disease or accident, and then is only obligated to find them with necessaries____
1 Blackstone’s Commentaries 449 (Lewis’s ed. 1898). This statement was based on 43 Eliz. Ch. 2.2 Borchert at
591, 45 A.2d 463. In any event, a number of the American states adopted the view that the common law went no *627further than to impose on parents the duty of supporting their minor children, and that as a general rule there was no obligation on the part of a parent to support an adult child. 1 A.L.R.2d at 914. See Recent Decision, Domestic Relations—Child Support—Parental Duty to Support a Subnormal Adult Child, 48 Miss.L.J. 361 (1977); Comment, The Parental Duty to Support Disabled Adult Children, 9 De Paul L.Rev. 245, 246-247 (1960).
In Maryland any doubt that parents were obliged to support their minor children was removed by the enactment early on of a statute now codified as § 88(b) of Art. 27. The statute made it a criminal offense for any parent to desert or wilfully neglect to provide for the support and maintenance of his or her minor child. Later the General Assembly enacted another statute to the same effect.3 These statutes left open, however, whether under Maryland law there was any parental duty to support an adult child. This Court had the question before it in Borchert but did not reach it because the father from whom support was sought expressly did “not dispute the obligation of the father to care for children, no matter what age, physically or mentally unable to take care of themselves____” 185 Md. at 592, 45 A.2d 463. He agreed “with this general statement of the law.” Id. The Court accepted this concession as the law of the case, but did not declare it to be the law of the State. Id.
The father’s concession in Borchert was made on these facts. The case arose from a divorce action and concerned a petition to amend an order for child support included in the decree granting a divorce a vinculo matrimonii. At the time of the order the child was a minor and shortly thereaft*628er became totally and permanently incapacitated. He reached the age of majority some 15 years later and continued to be a helpless invalid. The mother, who had custody, could not properly provide for the child, but the father, a man of comfortable means (he owned valuable property and was the recipient of a large income), was fully able to do so. The mother’s petition asked that the father be ordered to pay a reasonable and adequate sum for the support of the child as long as it continued under the disability.
The case not only brought into the open the inadequacies of the Maryland law on the matter but spotlighted those inadequacies. The Court determined that even if there were a duty on a father to support an incapacitated adult child, there was no provision in the Maryland law by which it could be enforced. The Court noted that there was no statute making the failure to perform the conceded duty a criminal offense. And neither the statute bestowing on a court4 of equity original jurisdiction over the support of children5 nor the statute empowering the court in an a mensa divorce action to order who shall be charged with the support of a child was sufficient to enable enforcement of such duty. Those statutes, the Court observed, referred to “children” and “unless we attempt judicial legislation that word must be construed as meaning children in the ordinary sense; that is those who have not reached their majority.” Borchert, 185 Md. at 593, 45 A.2d 463. The Court observed:
However desirable it may be for some power to exist by which a father may be compelled to support his son, under the circumstances set out in these proceedings, the Legislature has not seen fit to make the failure to do so a *629criminal offense although it has so designated such failure in other domestic situations.... The omission by the legislative branch of the government of such a statute is an indication that the failure to support an incapacitated child is placed by it on a different footing from the failure to support a minor child. We cannot now without further legislative action hold that the divorce statute attempted to be invoked in this case is enlarged to include other than minor children. Id. at 594-595, 45 A.2d 463.
The Court held that the demurrer to the Bill of Complaint should have been sustained and reversed the order overruling it.
The General Assembly promptly responded to the plain suggestion in Borchert. It enacted Acts 1947, Ch. 113, now set out in Maryland Code (1957, 1982 Repl.Yol.) Art. 27, § 97. The statute reads:
Any person who has an adult child destitute of means and unable to support himself by reason of mental or physical infirmity, who is possessed of or able to earn means sufficient to provide such child with necessary shelter, food, care and clothing and who neglects or refuses so to do, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction thereof, shall be fined not more than $1,000.00 or imprisoned for not more than one year, or both.
In Smith v. Smith, 227 Md. 355, 176 A.2d 862, the Court was again concerned with the duty of a father to support his incapacitated destitute adult child. The matter arose in an action for permanent alimony. On appeal, the father challenged an order included in the decree that he support his incapacitated adult child. The Court thought that it was significant that “at the first opportunity after the Borchert decision further legislative action was in fact taken.” Smith at 360, 176 A.2d 862. “The passage of [the 1947] act,” the Court declared, “is a clear indication of legislative intent to place failure to support an incapacitated child on *630an equal footing with failure to support a minor child.” Id. In the Court’s “opinion, therefore, the Chancellor was justified in recognizing this legislative policy and awarding support payments for the disabled adult child, whom the testimony showed was destitute of othér means of maintenance.” Id.
Borchert made clear that any duty on the part of a parent to support an incapacitated, destitute, adult child would have to be under the authority of a statute. Smith certainly stands for the proposition that an equity court in a domestic case may order a parent to support such a child, insofar as that duty is imposed by the 1947 statute.6 Smith, however, does not define the scope and extent of the duty the statute imposes on a parent.
The father urges that the Smith holding did not encompass the situation in which the child became incapacitated after attaining the age of majority. In other words, he argues that the duty applied only when the incapacity occurred before the child was emancipated. The rationale for this view is that if an incapacitated child reaches the age of majority it is not thereby emancipated but remains a minor. The majority dismiss this contention on the ground that Smith did not base its holding on such reasoning. As I read Smith, the Court said no more in its brief treatment of this matter than that the equity court could recognize a legislative policy inherent in the statute and that this legislative policy was to place failure to support an incapacitated child on an equal footing with failure to support a minor child. Smith simply does not express a position on whether a parental duty to support an incapacitated destitute adult child arises only when the incapacity occurs before the child *631is emancipated or whether the duty is invoked even though the incapacity occurred after emancipation. The factual circumstances, however, on which that opinion was decided, were that the incapacity of the child occurred before it attained the age of majority. As the majority point out, this was not clear from the opinion, but it was evident from the briefs submitted. The Smith Court was certainly aware of it. It seems to me that a view that the opinion went no further than the facts required it to do is more sound, in the absence of a stated position, than a notion that the opinion went beyond the facts in its holding. In short, I do not believe that Smith, in its very brief treatment of the subject, teaches what the majority would have it say. But if it does, I think that it is wrong, and I would renounce it without further ado so that it may not serve as the basis for more bad law. In any event, I turn, as the majority finally do, to Art. 27, § 97. As Borchert makes clear, the question here can only be resolved upon due regard of the statute.7
As we have seen, supra, the opinion in Borchert, which prompted the enactment of the statute, made perfectly clear that the incapacity of the child in that case occurred before the child attained the age of majority. This circumstance was, therefore, readily available to the Legislature. The desire of that body to remedy the deficiency in the law discovered in Borchert was in the light of that factual situation, and not as to an incapacity occurring after a child had been emancipated.
*632Section 97 of Article 27 imposes the duty to support an incapacitated destitute adult child on “[a]ny person who has ...” the child. The designation of the person chargeable with support is plain, unambiguous and unequivocal. The duty is not restricted, to parents, but, as the statute clearly says, to “any person.” So when the statute speaks in terms of one who “has” a child it is not referring only to one who “has a child” in the sense that a person is the child’s natural father or mother. Since this Court has determined that the legislative intent in enacting § 97 was to place “failure to support an incapacitated child on equal footing with failure to support a minor child,” Smith, 227 Md. at 360, 176 A.2d 862,1 look for guidance with respect to the meaning of “has an adult child” to § 96 imposing the duty to support a minor child. Section 96, unlike § 88(b) which runs only to “any parent,” imposes the duty to support a minor child on “[a]ny person having the care, custody or possession” of the child. I think that it is apparent that the phrase “has an adult child” used in § 97 contemplates “having the care, custody or possession” of the adult child as spelled out in § 96. Each section must be read in the light of the other.
This leads to the matter of emancipation.8
The law imposes a certain bondage upon minor children, but it also permits release therefrom. Such release, which sets the child free from legal subjection and gives it the right to labor for itself and collect and control its own wages, is called “emancipation.”
A child is emancipated, of course, upon arriving at the age of majority, although not where, on account of some infirmity of mind or body rendering him incapable of taking care of himself, he is compelled to remain with the parent. Emancipation of this kind is effected by operation of law. 59 Am.Jur.2d § 93 at 191.
*633See Monticello v. Monticello, 271 Md. 168, 172, 315 A.2d 520, cert. denied, 419 U.S. 880, 95 S.Ct. 145, 42 L.Ed.2d 121 (1974); Washburn, Post-Majority Support: Oh, Dad, Poor Dad, 44 Temp.L.Q. xxxxxxxx 319, 344-346 (1971). A minor child is subject to the authority and control of its parents. “The father and mother are the joint natural guardians of their [minor] child ... and are jointly and severally charged with its support, care, nurture, welfare and education. They shall have equal powers and duties.... ” Md.Code (1957, 1983 Repl.Yol.) Art. 72A, § 1. A parent is entitled to the services and earnings of a minor child. Id. § 2. The legal rights and liabilities as to both the parents and the child are extinguished, however, upon emancipation. 59 Am.Jur.2d § 93 at 191-192. A severance of the relationship between parents and minor child by the coming of age of a child who is capable of taking care of himself
relinquishes the parent’s claim to the child’s services, thus conferring on him the right to his own time and earnings. It frees the parents from their duty of care and the child from their custody, control, and authority. It terminates the parents’ legal duty to support the child.... Id.
Once completely emancipated by reaching the age of majority with no impediment sufficient to overcome the presumption of emancipation arising by the coming of age, the adult child thereafter cannot relapse into pupilage except by the consent, express or implied, of parent and child. Cf, J. Areen, Family Law, 847-848 (1978).
It may be that Jannette was completely emancipated before she attained the age of majority. See H. Clark, The Law of Domestic Relations in the United States, § 8.3 (1968). In any event, she was clearly completely emancipated upon becoming of age. The obligation of her father to support Jannette was then ended by the terms of the decree for support and was later formally terminated by court order. She was employed and earned enough to support *634herself; her parents, of course, had no claim on her earnings or services. She established a domicile separate from that of either parent. She enjoyed the power to enter into binding contracts and conveyances. In short, she went her own way as an adult, free and clear of any parental control and authority.
The mere fact that Jannette subsequently became disabled did not change this relationship with her father. He could not force his authority and control on her, dictate where she was to reside, or otherwise run her life. That is, she did not become “de-emancipated” by reason, of her disability; she did not thereby relapse into pupilage. Her father certainly had a moral obligation to care for her, but he had no legal obligation to do so. In other words, as between Jannette and her father, the father did not fit into the category of a “person who has an adult child” within the contemplation of § 97.
The majority seeks support in § 3-6A-01(d) of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article wherein “minor child” is defined as including “a child 18 years of age or older who, because of mental or physical disability, is dependent upon a parent.” They point out that the definition does not recognize a distinction based on emancipation. I do not believe that this statute, enacted in 1978, and concerned with an entirely different matter—the distribution of marital property in divorce and annulment—reflects any legislative intent with respect to the enactment of Art. 27, § 97 thirty-three years prior. The utter lack of connection, even by inference, of § 97 and § 3-6A-01(d) is readily apparent when considered in the light of § 3-6A-06(a). That section explains that the authority of the court regarding the marital property “shall be exercised to permit the children of the family to continue to live in the environment and community which is familiar to them and to permit the continued occupancy of the family home and possession and use of family use personal property by a spouse with *635custody of a minor child who has a need to live in that home.”
A more appropriate indication of the thinking of the Legislature with respect to the support of children is found in the Health-General Article of the Maryland Code. Md. Code (1982, 1983 Cum.Supp.) § 16-102 of the Health-General Article announces that “[i]t is the policy of this State to obligate each recipient of services and, to the extent provided in this title, those legally responsible for the recipient to pay, if financially able, for the cost of care that is received by the recipient of services.” 9 A person chargeable for the cost of services includes “[a]ny responsible relative....” § 16-101(c)(l). A “responsible relative” encompasses “[t]he parents of a recipient of services who is a minor____” § 16-101(f)(2). (Emphasis supplied). Thus the Legislature has not seen fit to make a parent pay for the support and care of an adult child. The parent would be chargeable, however, for the support and care of an adult child who was incapacitated at the time it attained the age of majority, for in that circumstance it would retain the status of a minor, the presumption of emancipation having been rebutted by the fact of the incapacity. This is precisely how I read § 97.
The incongruity of the majority’s holding is obvious when considered in the light of the above provisions of the Health Article. Under the majority view, the parents have the duty of care and support, not only of a minor child, but also of an incapacitated destitute adult child regardless of the child’s emancipation. But if the care and support of an incapacitated destitute adult child is provided by the State, then there is no legal duty imposed on the parents to *636reimburse the State. The obligation of parents to reimburse the State is only with respect to a minor child.
Statutory provisions regarding the paternity of a child born out of wedlock also shed light on the Legislature’s policy as to child support. The man declared to be the father may be ordered by the equity court to pay a certain sum for the support and maintenance of the child
until the child reaches the age of 18 years, dies, marries or becomes self-supporting, whichever event first occurs. However, if the child, having reached 18 years of age, is destitute of means and unable to support himself by reason of mental or physical infirmity, the court may require payments to be made or continued during the continuance of the mental or physical infirmity. Md.Code (1957, 1981 Repl.Yol.) Art. 16, § 66H(a)(l).
This provision clearly recognizes emancipation as serving to extinguish the duty to provide support. And the language used for the continuance of support payments after the child has attained the age of majority—“if the child having reached 18 years of age, is destitute of means and [incapacitated]”—patently applies only when the incapacity occurred prior to reaching 18 years of age.
The majority’s attempt to. distinguish the health and paternity statutes which I have referred to is far from persuasive. I find the majority’s view to be more self-serving than logical. Contrary to' their assertions, I think, for the reasons herein set out, that those statutes and the statute here reflect a consistent legislative policy, namely, that there is no parental duty to support a destitute adult child who becomes incapacitated after he has been emancipated.
It is my opinion that the Master below was correct and that the Chancellor was wrong. I would reverse the judgment of the Circuit Court for Montgomery County.
I am authorized to state that Chief Judge MURPHY and Judge COLE concur in the views here expressed.

. "Incapacitated,” "disabled," and "incompetent” are bespoken herein in terms of "a mental or physical infirmity.”
"Destitute” is used in the context of without means or the ability to be self-supporting by reason of a mental or physical infirmity.

. 43 Eliz. Ch. 2 is not one of the English statutes in force in Maryland. Borchert v. Borchert, 185 Md. 586, 590-591, 45 A.2d 463 (1946).

. "Any person having the care, custody or possession of any child under eighteen years of age, who shall desert or abandon such child with the intent that it shall become a public charge, or without making provision for its proper support and maintenance for a period of at least three years with some responsible person or institution duly authorized to take and care for infants, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor....” Maryland Code (1957, 1982 Repl.Vol.) Art. 27, § 96.

. Then Maryland Code (1939) Art. 16, § 41; now Maryland Code (1973, 1984 Repl.Vol.) § 3-602 of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article.

. Then Maryland Code (1939) Art. 16, § 85; now Maryland Code (1957, 1981 Repl.Vol.) Art. 16, § 25.

. We point out that Acts 1947, Ch. 113 also established a comprehensive scheme whereby every incapacitated destitute child could obtain support from its parent through a State’s Attorney. Maryland Code (1957, 1982 Repl.VoL, 1983 Cum.Supp.) Art. 27, §§ 98-103. See also, Art. 27, §§ 90-93.

. Cases in other jurisdictions are of no help. They are decided on the common law, which under Borchert is not applicable in Maryland, or under their own peculiar statutes, or upon no authority except the raising of a moral obligation to the status of a legal obligation. Even within those areas of authority there is a great diversity of opinion. See Annot., 1 A.L.R.2d 910 (1948); Recent Decision, Domestic Relations—Child Support—Parental Duty to Support a Subnormal Child, 48 Miss.L.J. 361 (1977); 59 Am.Jur.2d, Parent and Child, §§ 102-103 (1971); Comment, The Parental Duty to Support Disabled Adult Children, 9 De Paul L.Rev. 245 (1960); Case Note, Family Law—Duty of Parent to Support an Adult Child, 11 Drake L.Rev. 60 (1961).

. For a history of the doctrine of emancipation see H. Clark, The Law of Domestic Relations in the United States 240-241 (1968).

. " 'Recipient of services’ means an individual who receives care, maintenance, treatment, or support in a facility or program that is operated or funded wholly or partly by the Department.” Maryland Code (1982, 1983 Cum.Supp.) § 16-101(e)(l) of the Health-General Article.