Here’s the frivolous lawsuit of the week. I wonder if the judge will award attorney’s fees. The National Center for Men seems like a hooplehead outfit.
A federal appeals court has upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit nicknamed “Roe v. Wade for Men” filed by a men’s rights group on behalf of a man who said he shouldn’t have to pay child support for his ex-girlfriend’s daughter.
Dubay, 25, had said ex-girlfriend Lauren Wells knew he didn’t want to have a child and assured him repeatedly she couldn’t get pregnant because of a medical condition….He argued that if a pregnant woman can choose among abortion, adoption or raising a child, a man involved in an unintended pregnancy should have the choice of declining the financial responsibilities of fatherhood.
U.S. District Judge David Lawson in Bay City disagreed, rejecting Dubay’s argument that Michigan’s paternity law violates the U.S. Constitution’s equal protection clause because it didn’t extend reproductive rights to men.
The suit was prepared for Dubay by the National Center for Men in Old Bethpage, New York., which dubbed it “Roe v. Wade for Men.” The nickname drew objections from women’s rights organizations.
The full story is here.
-Ralph Michael Stein
The “right not to be a parent” argument surfaces from time to time. The best article I have read on that subject is Tracey S. Pachman, “Disputes Over Frozen Preembryos and the ‘Right Not to Be a Parent,'” 12 Colum. J. Gender & L. 128 (2003). Although Mr. Dubay’s case was dismissed as frivolous, some courts have been receptive to the equal protection argument in similar, but distinguishable, cases.