Michelle W. v. Ronald W.

• Decision Date: 05 August 1985
• Citation: Michelle W. v. Ronald W., 39 Cal.3d 354, 216 Cal.Rptr. 748, 703 P.2d 88 (Cal. 1985)
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 703 P.2d 88 MICHELLE W., a Minor, etc., et al., Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. RONALD W. et al., Defendants and Respondents. L.A. 31758.

Page 748

216 Cal.Rptr. 748

39 Cal.3d 354, 703 P.2d 88

MICHELLE W., a Minor, etc., et al., Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. RONALD W. et al., Defendants and Respondents.

L.A. 31758.

Supreme Court of California In Bank.

Aug. 5, 1985.

Bruce M. Beals, Kimberly J. Grove, Lightner & Castro, San Diego, for plaintiffs and appellants.

Latham & Watkins, Lance B. Wickman and Robert P. Dahlquist, San Diego, for defendants and respondents.

REYNOSO, Justice.

No human bond is cemented with greater strength than that of parent and child. We address the claims of two who assert they are the father of a daughter. One was the mother's husband; he raised, loved and nurtured the child until temporarily prevented from doing so after a divorce. The second claimant contends he is the natural father, has since married the mother and now lives with her and the child. By this triangular litigation each claimant seeks to be declared the legal father; the child, too, seeks a determination.

Evidence Code section 621 declares the presumption that "... the issue of a wife cohabiting with her husband ... is presumed to be a child of the marriage." ¹ In conformity with the statute, the trial court entered summary judgment in favor of the defendant below, Ronald W. Plaintiffs Donald R. and Michelle W., a minor, appeal challenging the constitutionality of the statute as applied to them. As will appear below, we hold that as applied to plaintiffs the statutory presumption violates neither the due process nor equal protection clauses of the California or United States Constitutions.

I

Defendants Ronald and Judith W. were married on May 7, 1965, and lived together as husband and wife until their separation approximately 12 years later. Judith gave birth to two daughters, Tamara and Michelle, who were raised as the children of that marriage. During the marriage to Judith, Ronald W. provided the necessary support for the children. As the father of Tamara and Michelle, he tended, nurtured and loved them and received affection from them. Through their daily interchanges with Ronald and Judith, Tamara and Michelle were provided with the security, as well as the restraints, they needed for their growth and development.

Donald R., the second claimant to the paternity of Michelle, met Judith in 1973. Donald R. and Judith began having sexual relations in that year, although Judith and Ronald W. were married and living together. On October 24, 1974, Judith gave birth to Michelle. Donald R. did not claim paternity at the time of birth nor thereafter for four years while Judith and Ronald W. remained married and continued to live together. Donald R. asserted no claim nor accepted any responsibility. Throughout that time, without objection from Donald R., the obligation of parenting was fulfilled by Ronald W.

When Ronald and Judith W. separated they executed a marriage settlement agreement; Ronald was granted custody of Tamara, Michelle's sister, and Judith custody of Michelle, by then nearly five years of age. The issue of paternity was not raised. Ronald's obligation to provide child support for Michelle was also not at issue; it was agreed upon.

Following the dissolution of their marriage, Ronald W. regularly and continually exercised his visitation rights with Michelle. In November 1980, when Donald R. married Judith, Ronald W. was refused further visitation. That right was restored when he threatened court action to enforce the settlement agreement. Since Judith's marriage to Donald R., Michelle has lived in Donald R.'s home and he has held her out to be his natural child.

In March 1981, this action to establish paternity was brought by Donald R. and Michelle, age six, through her guardian ad litem. Upon the uncontradicted facts that Ronald W. and Judith were living together as a married couple for nine years before Michelle's birth and that Ronald W. was neither impotent nor sterile, the trial court applied the presumption of section 621 and established that Ronald W. is the father of Michelle. Plaintiffs appeal.

II

The presumption of paternity established by section 621 is limited. The following prerequisites must be satisfied: first, the child's mother must be married; second, the mother must be cohabiting with her husband; third, the husband must be neither impotent nor sterile; fourth, two years must have passed since the birth of the child and during those two years the husband--or the mother in conjunction with the putative father--must have failed to rebut the presumption in court.

Plaintiffs assert alternative grounds for holding section 621 unconstitutional. First, section 621 prevents them from establishing the biological parent-child relationship in a court of law, thus depriving them of a liberty interest protected by the due process clause. Second, the gender-based classification of the statute which accords the natural father fewer procedural protections than the married natural mother violates the equal protection guarantee of the California and United States Constitutions. ² In addition, they argue that the classifications in the statute deny them a fundamental right and thus the law should be strictly scrutinized.

A. Due Process Claims

We review two interests, that of the child and that of the alleged natural father. As to plaintiff Donald R., we hold that the statute is constitutional as applied. No due process violation can be found in applying the presumption to the facts of this case. Our conclusion is based upon a weighing of the competing private and public interests. We find that the public interest in protecting the family unit and promoting familial stability outweighs Donald R.'s interest.

1. The Putative Father's Claim

Does the application of the presumption of section 621 violate Donald R.'s due process rights? We have held that the issue of whether section 621 adequately protects a putative father's interests "must be resolved by weighing the competing private and state interests." (In re Lisa R. (1975) 13 Cal.3d 636, 648, 119 Cal.Rptr. 475, 532 P.2d 123, cert. den. (1975) 421 U.S. 1014, 95 S.Ct. 2421, 44 L.Ed.2d 682, rehg. den. (1975) 423 U.S. 885, 96 S.Ct. 159, 46 L.Ed.2d 166.) In Board of Regents v. Roth (1972) 408 U.S. 564, 570, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 2705, 33 L.Ed.2d 548, the high court explained that "a weighing process has long been a part of any determination of the form of hearing required in particular situations...." (Emphasis in original.)

The United States Supreme Court has scrutinized, under the due process clause, state laws limiting a natural father's relationship with his illegitimate offspring in three seminal cases, ³ Stanley v. Illinois (1972) 405 U.S. 645, 92 S.Ct. 1208, 31 L.Ed.2d 551, Quilloin v. Walcott (1978) 434 U.S. 246, 98 S.Ct. 549, 54 L.Ed.2d 511, reh. den. (1978) 435 U.S. 918, 98 S.Ct. 1477, 55 [39 Cal.3d 361] L.Ed.2d 511, and most recently in Lehr v. Robertson (1983) 463 U.S. 248, 103 S.Ct. 2985, 77 L.Ed.2d 614.

In Stanley, an unwed father lost custody of his three children upon the death of the children's unwed mother. The father, Stanley, had lived with the children and their mother since their birth and they were summarily taken and placed with court appointed guardians without any prior hearing. This deprivation was found to violate the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Justice Powell, writing for the court, concluded that Illinois, "insists on presuming rather than proving Stanley's unfitness solely because it is more convenient to presume than to prove. Under the Due Process Clause that advantage is insufficient to justify refusing a father a hearing when the issue at stake is the dismemberment of his family." (405 U.S., at p. 658, 92 S.Ct. at 1216.) Thus, Illinois could not automatically destroy the Stanley family and uproot the children without first providing the father with the opportunity to be heard on the issue of parental fitness.

The limits on a putative father's due process rights were addressed in Quilloin v. Walcott, supra, 434 U.S. 246, 98 S.Ct. 549, 54 L.Ed.2d 511, where the Supreme Court held that a Georgia statute which denied an unwed father the right to veto an adoption of his illegitimate child did not violate the due process clause. The father in that case only sought to claim paternity after the mother and her new husband had initiated adoption proceedings. The court held that the denial of the father's legitimation petition--found by the trial court to be in the child's best interest--did not violate the due process clause.

Finally, the court most recently addressed this issue in Lehr v. Robertson, supra, 463 U.S. 248, 103 S.Ct. 2985, 77 L.Ed.2d 614. Lehr, the putative father, sought to invalidate an adoption order granted in favor of the biological mother and her husband. The child was already two years old at the time and the father "never had any significant custodial, personal, or financial relationship with [the child], and he did not seek to establish a legal tie until she was two years old." (Id., at p. 262, 103 S.Ct. at p. 2994, fn. omitted.)

This court has examined the conclusive presumption of paternity in Lisa R., supra, 13 Cal.3d 636, 119 Cal.Rptr. 475, 532 P.2d 123, where a putative father sought to continue the parent-child relationship he had established with his daughter. In Lisa R., although the minor child was presumed to be legitimate, both of her parents were deceased and the child was being adjudicated a dependent of the juvenile court. With adoption proceedings by foster parents pending, Lisa's putative father sought to prove his paternity and obtain visitation rights. Following the United States Supreme Court's decision in Stanley v. Illinois, supra, 405 U.S. 645, 92 S.Ct. 1208, 31 L.Ed.2d 551, we held that the Evidence Code's preclusion of proof of paternity offended the constitutional guarantee of due process of law.

The difference between the state threatened dissolution and termination of a...