Court Opinion

ID: 9710141
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 04:02:56.544957+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:54.578088
License: Public Domain

Wilkie, C. J.
(concurring). While I have no objection to the remand here to consider the placement of custody of the children on the basis of what is in their best interests, I am convinced, on this record, that the plaintiff husband was unfit as a matter of law. Unfitness is more than a matter of “morals.” As a matter of fact, the *686statute dealing with care and custody of minor children describes unfitness in these terms:
“247.24 ... if the court finds either that the parents are unable to adequately care for any such child or are not fit and proper persons to have the care and custody thereof, . . .”
Fitness then is measured in terms of ability to adequately care for a child.1
The evidence here shows conclusively that the father was unfit at the time of the custody hearing. Although the father, at the time of the custody hearing, had made a substantial about-face in his moral conduct, there is little in the record to indicate any substantial concern for the welfare and care of his children. He had seen them very infrequently over the years and was badly delinquent in the payment of support for them. There is no question in my mind but that the trial court’s finding of fitness on the part of the father at the time of the hearing is against the clear preponderance and great weight of the evidence.
I have been authorized to state that Mr. Justice Beilfuss joins in this concurrence.

 Dees v. Dees (1969), 41 Wis. 2d 435, 164 N. W. 2d 282; Larson v. Larson (1966), 30 Wis. 2d 291, 140 N. W. 2d 230.