TOM JAMES: Impact of child support enforcement on custody, Part I.

The essential nature of the child support order underwent a significant change in the nineteenth century. With the sanctification of motherhood (stay-at-home mothering) attendant to the intensification of the division of social roles by sex wrought by the Industrial Revolution came a growing concern among judges that single, divorced and separated women and their children would become a financial burden on the community (the state). Unless the father or ex-husband provided for them economically, a mother and her children could become dependent either on the state or on the limited resources of charitable relief organizations for their support. As a result, late nineteenth century judges increasingly cited a public policy in favor of preventing women and children from becoming financial burdens upon the state as the basis for their support orders. For this reason, courts began to describe a father’s child support obligation as being more than a merely private obligation between parents; now it was also a “duty to the public.” . . .

The concept of child support as a civic obligation, as distinguished from a purely private one, was reflected in the criminal nonsupport statutes that were enacted in the nineteenth century. . . .

Consistent with the intent of these statutes, a father could not be punished merely for failing to contribute money to his children unless they actually went without parental support. It was only those fathers who put their children at risk of becoming dependent on state funds for their support who could be prosecuted under these statutes.

In most states today, a parent may be prosecuted for nonsupport even if the other parent is independently wealthy.

Footnotes at the link.