Court Opinion

ID: 9657417
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 20:25:24.593325+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:44.901260
License: Public Domain

DYKMAN, J.
(dissenting). I dissent from the majority opinion because I am unable to agree with its application of § 48.415(l)(a)3, STATS.1 That statute reads:
Abandonment maybe established by a showing that:
3. The child has been left by the parent with a relative or other person, the parent knows or could discover the whereabouts of the child and the parent has failed to visit or communicate with the child for a period of one year or longer.
The first step in statutory interpretation is to look at the language of the statute, because if that language is clear, we go no further. Village of Shorewood v. Steinberg, 174 Wis. 2d 191, 201, 496 N.W.2d 57, 61 (1993). It is at this point that I part company with the majority. I conclude that the phrase, "[t]he child has been left by the parent with a relative or other person" is unambiguous. It requires that the parent leave the child with a relative or another person. Section 48.415(1)(a)3, Stats., does not apply to Franklin. He did not leave Christopher with anyone. Christopher's mother took Christopher from Franklin. It is therefore improper to use a dictionary to determine what the statute means. What the majority has done is to impute an ambiguity in § 48.415(1)(a)3, by using a dictionary definition of the word "left."
*714The majority does not conclude that § 48.415(l)(a)3, STATS., is ambiguous. Instead, it holds that the word "left" is ambiguous. That is not the test. Were that the test, few, if any, statutes would be clear. For instance, "left" also indicates a direction, i.e., the opposite of "right." Yet, the majority does not conclude that "left" is ambiguous because the word "left" may also mean the opposite of "right." A word is but a part of a statute. When we examine a statute in its entirety, a word within the statute which alone is ambiguous can and usually does lose its ambiguity. Professor James Willard Hurst writes:
Words do not have meaning in the abstract. They have meaning with reference only to some subject which those choosing the words mean to address. We cannot answer the question, what is the ordinary meaning of the word "ring" without asking a prior question: Is the speaker talking about a signal from a telephone, an ornament to slip on a finger, an arena under a circus tent? Often the difficult problem is to identify the subject the legislature intends to deal with; if we know that, then the ordinary meaning of the words, used with reference to that subject, is likely to present no serious issue.
James Willard Hurst, Dealing With Statutes 58-59 (1982).
In the context of a statute dealing with the termination of parental rights because of parental abandonment, the phrase "[t]he child has been left by the parent with a relative or other person" has but one meaning, and that meaning does not permit the statute to be applied to the facts of this case.
The majority's view of this statute means that abandonment may be found under § 48.415(l)(a)3, Stats., every time the parent has little or no contact *715with a child. However, this reading ignores the words "by the parent" and "with a relative or other person." Under the majority's view, the fact that the parent is not the party responsible for placing a child with another person is irrelevant. The majority does not believe that § 48.415(l)(a)3 addresses the cause of why the child and parent are separated, but only looks at what has happened after the fact of separation. But the statute does not read only "the child has been left," it reads, "the child has been left by the parent with a relative or other person." When these words are read together, I conclude that they mean that the parent has instigated the separation by placing a child with someone else and, later, has made little or no attempt to further contact the child.
A "cardinal rule of statutory construction" is to interpret statutes so as to give meaning to all of the words. IBM Credit Corp. v. Village of Allouez, 188 Wis. 2d 143, 153, 524 N.W.2d 132, 135 (1994). If one is to accept the majority's interpretation of § 48.415(1)(a)3, Stats., which makes the phrase "by the parent with a relative or other person" surplusage, its inclusion must be attributed to legislative oversight. But I do not believe that phrase appears by happenstance. Section 48.415(1)(a)3 is the third method the legislature provided for establishing parental abandonment. The first method is found in § 48.415(1)(a)1. That statute reads:
Abandonment may be established by a showing that:
1. The child has been left without provision for its care or support, the petitioner has investigated the circumstances surrounding the matter and for 60 days the petitioner has been unable to find either parent.
*716The legislature included the phrase "by the parent" in § 48.415(1)(a)3 after the words "[t]he child has been left," but omitted the phrase in § 48.415(l)(a)l. If a word or words are used in one statute but are not used in a similar statute, we must conclude that the legislature specifically intended the words to have meaning. See Cardinal v. Leader Nat'l Ins. Co., 166 Wis. 2d 375, 388, 480 N.W.2d 1, 6 (1992) (the omission of a word or words in the revision of a statute indicates an intent to alter its meaning). I do not think it likely that "by the parent," a phrase not used in § 48.415(l)(a)l, but included in § 48.415(1)(a)3, was accidental. It was intended to have meaning, a meaning the majority has removed from the statute.
My conclusion is unchanged were I to accept the majority's holding that the word "left". in § 48.415(l)(a)3, Stats., renders the statute ambiguous. The legislative history of the statute suggests to me that the legislature intended a narrow interpretation of the word "abandonment."
In 1979, State Representative Stephen Leopold asked John Franz, a staff attorney and policy specialist with the Youth Policy and Law Center, Inc., to draft revisions to the statutes regulating the termination of parental rights. Franz did so, and sent an extensive draft to Representative Leopold and to a Legislative Reference Bureau bill drafter, Kathleen Curran. That draft became 1979 A.B. 656, and ultimately Laws of 1979, ch. 330, § 6.2 A letter accompanying the draft *717asks Curran to consider In re Kegel, 85 Wis. 2d 574, 271 N.W.2d 114 (1978), especially Justice Abrahamson's dissent in that case. It also contains a note: "See Family Law Quarterly Fall 1978 Volume 12, Number 3 — Model Act on Subject."3
The draft revision by Franz is in the form of a memorandum dated December 21, 1978, addressed to Representative Leopold. It is remarkably similar to the present statute. Section 48.41 of the draft is entitled "Jurisdiction Grounds for Termination of Parental Rights." The second ground for termination is "abandonment," and reads:
(2) Abandonment. A presumption of abandonment which may be rebutted by competent evidence presented at a hearing under s. 48.417 shall be established by a showing that:
(c) The child has been left by the parent with a relative or other person for care, and the parent for a period of one year failed to visit or communicate with the child, and despite due-diligence by-the agency seeking termination,-the parent-has-not been found.
The draft shows that the phrase "and despite due diligence by the agency seeking termination, the parent has not been found" has been stricken. But the phrase that is at issue in the case before us," [t]he child has been left by the parent with a relative or other person," was included in § 48.415(l)(a)3, STATS., from the beginning.
*718Justice Abrahamson's dissent in Kegel took issue with the majority's conclusion that termination of a mother's parental rights was in the best interests of the children. Kegel, 85 Wis. 2d at 589, 271 N.W.2d at 121. She did so in part because the majority placed unquestioning reliance on the continuity of the psychological parent-child relationship theory. Id. at 587, 271 N.W.2d at 120. Justice Abrahamson noted that this theory was the subject of great controversy. She concluded: "The power to terminate parental rights, the power to sever permanently the legal ties between parent and child, is an awesome governmental power. Such power should be exercised with restraint." Id. at 589, 271 N.W.2d at 121.
Section 2(a)(4)(iv) of the Model Act to Free Children for Permanent Placement with Commentary, noted on Franz's memo dated January 3, 1979, provides:
[Abandonment is conclusively presumed if the child is found under such circumstances that the identity or whereabouts of the parent is unknown and has not been ascertained by diligent searching and the parent does not claim the child within 2 months after the child is found.
Sanford N. Katz, Freeing Children for Permanent Placement Through a Model Act, 12 Fam. L.Q. 203, 209 (1978). The commentary to this section notes:
The Model Act's definition of "abandonment" [(a)(4)(iv)] is a narrow one which addresses the situation of a "foundling" left without any clue to the identity of the parent and under circumstances that indicate a complete abdication of all parental responsibility for the child.
Id. at 213.
*719By memo dated March 29,1979, addressed to Representative Leopold, Senator Lynn Adelman and Curran, Franz notes:
As was requested at our meeting on March 27th this is an attempt to present a commentary to the sections of the TPR draft bill as they are currently formulated. In the commentary I will try to explain what the section is intended to accomplish, issues that it raises, and changes from current statute.
Under the subheading "Abandonment," Franz's memo reads: "The one year abandonment is intended to cover those children for whom parents make some provision for care by leaving them with relatives or friends but who subsequently are not visited or cared for by their parents." (Emphasis added.) Franz's discussion of the three "types of abandonment" tracks exactly the three ways of establishing abandonment in § 48.415(l)(a), STATS. The "one year abandonment" noted in Franz's memo is § 48.415(l)(a)3, the section used to terminate Franklin's parental rights.
A policy memo from the Youth Policy and Law Center dated April 2,1979, notes:
Abandonment is not as clear cut a concept .as the word indicates. One way of defining it more clearly is to establish time limits for a rebuttable presumption of abandonment depending on the circumstances in which the parent leaves the child. If the parent disappears without making any provision for the care of the child, the time limit should be short, perhaps 30 days. If the parent leaves the child with a relative or a friend and there is some degree of responsibility expressed, a greater inquiry and longer time limits should be required.
(Emphasis added.)
*720Had the legislature adopted a variant of the parental rights statute known as the Plum-Nelson suggestions, I would agree with the majority.4 That version of § 48.415(l)(a)3, Stats., had it been adopted, would have read:
(c) The child is in the care of a relative or other person, the child is not [the] subject of a dispo-sitional order under 48.355, the parent knows or could discover the whereabouts of the child, and the parent for a period of two years5 failed to visit or communicate with the child.
But the legislature did not choose the Plum-Nelson version of what must be shown to prove "abandonment." Instead, it chose the more narrow definition of "abandonment" suggested by the Model Act.
I believe that the majority has assumed that all children whose parents have had little contact with them should fall within one of the categories chosen by the legislature permitting termination of parental rights. This is a dangerous assumption. The majority writes: "The purpose of the subsection is to permit a finding of abandonment where there has been incidental or no contact for specified periods of time, in the absence of certain rebuttal evidence." Majority op. at 706.
This is the majority's view of what our termination of parental rights legislation was intended to cover. But, as the dissent in Kegel notes, and the commentary to the Model Act explains, there is another side to a *721termination dispute. A parent has a fundamental liberty interest in raising his or her child. Santosky v. Kramer, 455 U.S. 745, 753 (1982). Not only must government bear a heavy burden before it can overcome that right, but opinions continue to vary as to the value of terminating parental rights even when a parent does not conform well to community values. Expert opinion varies as to whether a parent with poor parenting skills is better or worse than an adoptive parent or no parent at all. I do not believe that judges can identify the correct answer to this question. The best we can do is to discover the solution adopted by the legislature and accept that as the proper answer to a difficult question.
I have examined the words, phrases and sentences adopted by the legislature, and I have viewed the legislative history of 1979 A.B. 656 and 1979 S.B. 479 that now remains. The legislature was entitled to and did hold a very different view of "abandonment" than the view now held by the majority. I conclude that the legislature intended a limited view of what "abandonment" means in a termination of parental rights context. Under that view, "abandonment" pursuant to § 48.415(l)(a)3, STATS., is proven by showing specific action on the part of a parent. That view necessarily requires a conclusion that Franklin’s action or inaction, whether we approve of it or not, does not constitute a § 48.415(l)(a)3 abandonment. The legislature did enact what the majority decries: A statute which means that a parent cannot be found to have abandoned a child unless the parent actively places the child with another person. Because I would not inter*722fere with the legislature's determination, I cannot join in the majority's opinion.

 Because I conclude that this case should be reversed because of the trial court's erroneous interpretation of § 48.415 (l)(a)3, Stats., I do not reach the other issues discussed in the majority opinion.

 Legislation similar to 1979 A.B. 656 was introduced in the Senate as 1979 S.B. 479. Representative Leopold cosponsored the Senate version. The relevant phrase, "[t]he child has been left by the parent with a relative or other person" was used in both 1979 A.B. 656 and 1979 S.B. 479, although at one stage, the Senate version used the phrase "[t]he child was left by the *717parent . . . ." (Emphasis added.) Section 48.415(l)(a)3, Stats., was created by 1979 A.B. 656. Laws of 1979, ch. 330, § 6.

 All legislation, whether drafted by the Legislative Reference Bureau or not, must be reviewed by the bureau. Section I3.92(l)(b)l, Stats.

 A Wisconsin Legislative Council Staff Memorandum dated January 17, 1980, identifies Pat Nelson of LAW, INC., and Henry Plum with the Milwaukee County Children's Court.

 The words "one year" were handwritten above the stricken words "two years."