Dubay v. Wells
| Decision Date | 17 July 2006 |
| Docket Number | No. 06-11016-BC.,06-11016-BC. |
| Citation | 442 F.Supp.2d 404 |
| Parties | Matthew DUBAY, Plaintiff, v. Lauren WELLS, an individual, and Saginaw County Prosecuting Attorney's Office, by and through, Michael D. Thomas, prosecutor, Defendants, and Michael A. Cox, Attorney General of the State of Michigan, Intervening-Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Michigan |
Jeffery A. Cojocar, Shelby Township, MI, for Plaintiff.
Lawrence W. Smith, Jr., Christina M. Grossi Gilbert, Smith, Saginaw, MI, for Defendants.
Joel D. McGormley, MI Department of Attorney General, Lansing, MI, for Intervening-Defendant.
Before the Court are motions to dismiss filed by the defendants and intervening defendant in this action initiated by plaintiff Matthew Dubay, who seeks a declaration that Michigan's paternity statutes are unconstitutional. Dubay also asks for an injunction to prevent the defendants from prosecuting a paternity action against him in the Saginaw County, Michigan circuit court. The motions were argued in open court on June 24, 2006.
According to the pleadings, Dubay commenced a personal relationship with defendant Lauren Wells, dated her, engaged in intimate sexual relations, impregnated her, terminated his relationship, and sued her for bearing his child. If chivalry is not dead, its viability is gravely imperiled by the plaintiff in this case.
But chivalry is not the issue here, nor does it provide a basis upon which to decide the legal and policy issues that Dubay seeks to advance through this litigation. Rather, the plaintiff contends that Michigan's paternity statutes are repugnant to the United States Constitution's Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses because he has no say, he argues, in the decision whether to beget and bear a child. Therefore, he insists, he ought not to be saddled with the financial responsibility of the child's support, and he should receive damages from the private and public defendants who are attempting to exact that toll from him.
The plaintiffs claims have been rejected by every court that has considered similar matters, and with good reason. The plaintiffs suggestion that the support provisions of the Michigan Paternity Act implicates the Equal Protection Clause does not find support in the jurisprudence. First, the Act's provisions apply only if a child is born and essentially do not concern anyone's right to choose to be a parent. Second, the statutory provisions are facially neutral, requiring both parents equally to support the child. Third, the plaintiff argues that enforcing the Act's provisions, without any deviation from the neutral language of those provisions, still can implicate the Equal Protection Clause because of an underlying inequality: the State's recognition that women can choose to be parents and men cannot. This argument in turn is based on the existence of a right supposedly grounded in substantive due process, as the plaintiff acknowledged at oral argument. But the Sixth Circuit has squarely rejected the argument that fairness or reciprocity generates a substantive right to avoid child support on the theory that a woman has the right to bring to term or terminate a pregnancy on her own. Finally, the plaintiff has failed to demonstrate in even the most remote way that state action plays a role in the interference with his choice to reject parenthood. The consequences of sexual intercourse have always included conception, and the State has nothing to do with this historical truism. Because the plaintiff has failed to state a colorable claim in his amended complaint, the Court will dismiss the complaint against all the defendants. In addition, the Court finds that the plaintiffs claim is frivolous, unreasonable, and without foundation. Therefore, the Court will grant the State's motion for attorney fees under 42 U.S.C. § 1988(b).
The facts, as alleged, are straightforward. According to the amended complaint, the plaintiff and defendant Wells had a child together, despite the plaintiffs express desires to the contrary and Wells's assurances that she was using some method of birth control and otherwise was infertile. The plaintiff claims that Wells then exercised her unilateral right not to abort the child. Sometime in 2005, the child, EGW, was born "much to the dismay, bewilderment and objection of Dubay who was at all times clear with his desires and intentions to Wells." Am. Compl. at ¶ 16.
The plaintiff thereafter had difficulty accepting the financial consequences of his conduct, so the State came to his assistance by bringing a legal action that would result in an established schedule the plaintiff could follow in contributing to the financial support of his daughter. Wells signed a paternity complaint, and the Saginaw County, Michigan prosecutor initiated proceedings pursuant to the Michigan Paternity Act, Mich. Comp. Laws § 722.711 et seq., to force the plaintiff to help support the child and share the costs of the delivery. The plaintiff sought a stay of proceedings in the Saginaw County circuit court so that this Court could address the plaintiffs claimed constitutional violations arising from Michigan's Paternity Act and its enforcement by the County prosecutor. The state trial court, however, denied the stay.
The complaint in this case was filed on March 9, 2006, and it was amended on March 29, 2006 before a responsive pleading was filed. The plaintiff summarized his claims and the relief requested as follows:
Specifically, besides other relief, Dubay is seeking a ruling finding that such practices and procedures, as initiated by these Defendants and which touch and detriment [sic] thousands of Michigan male residents each year, run afoul of the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution and must be deemed illegal as a matter of law.
The single count of the amended complaint alleges violations of the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution and Article 1, section 2 of the Michigan constitution. Although Dubay offers several polemical statements in his amended pleading, the gravamen of his claim can be summarized in these allegations:
22. Under our nation's evolving jurisprudence, the right to privacy as protected under the concept of personal liberty has never been confined solely to females, as this right is supposed to extend to both men and women in deciding whether to bear or beget a child.
23. This fundamental right protected by the United States Constitution entails two separate rights that should not, and cannot, be segregated or selectively enforced by parties such as these Defendants. Specifically, it includes the right to procreate as well as the right to avoid procreation by men and women alike. As applied to the instant set of circumstances, the practice and pursuits of each of these Defendants under the guise of state law through Michigan's selectively enforced Paternity Act, which are perpetrated upon similarly situated men throughout this state, are discriminatory in nature and do deny individuals such as, and including, Dubay from [sic] the Equal Protection of the law under both federal and state Constitutions and guarantees.
. . . . .
26. Michigan's Paternity Act as enforced, as demonstrated and exhibited by the actions of these Defendants, is an unequivocal violation of equal protection. Such practices and procedures impose special, broad and dissimilar responsibilities and obligations upon men such as Dubay, while affording certain privileges, rights and choices to be unilaterally made and exercised by females such as Wells, all to the societal, financial, emotional, psychological and other detriment of Dubay and other similarly situated men.
The plaintiff alleges that as a result of the unlawful enforcement of the Paternity Act, he has "[e]ndur[ed] a loss of liberty and . . . dignity; [s]ustain[ed] a loss of public esteem; has [s]ubject[ed] himself to embarrassment, public ridicule, anger, loss of self esteem, etc.; [i]ncurred substantial expense in being forced not only to pursue and seek the protection of his rights, but also to defend himself from the legal process and actions of these Defendants; and [sustained] [o]ther such damages as may become known throughout the course of discovery in this matter." Am. Compl at ¶ 30. The plaintiff asks this Court to declare that the defendants' actions and practices violate the Equal Protection Clause, declare the Michigan Paternity Act unconstitutional as applied to him, enjoin enforcement of the Act against him and all other men similarly situated, and award him monetary damages, attorney fees, and other appropriate equitable relief.
On May 19, 2006, the State of Michigan intervened through its attorney general because the constitutionality of the state paternity statute was at issue. In lieu of filing an answer, the State filed a motion to dismiss. On April 26, 2006, the Saginaw County prosecutor likewise filed a motion to dismiss.
Motions to dismiss are governed by Rule 12(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and allow for dismissal for "failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted." Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Mayer v. Mylod, 988 F.2d 635, 638 (6th Cir.1993). When deciding a motion under that Rule, "[t]he court must construe the complaint in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, accept all factual allegations as true, and determine whether the plaintiff undoubtedly can prove no set of facts in support of his claims that would entitle him to relief." Cline v. Rogers, 87 F.3d 176, 179 ' (6th Cir.1996). "[A] judge may not grant a Rule 12(b)(6) motion based...
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