Friend Of The Court 'friend Of Children'

(Editor's Note: This ís the scconaoi i four articles on the widespread problem ot clivorc'e.) "I've known more guys who spend more time and care picking out a car than they do a life-long mate." So says Richard S. Benedek, one of the county's foremost experts on marriage and divorce. Benedek is Washtenaw County's Friend of the Court, but he prefers to think of himself as the friend of the children. The major concern of his office, Benedek says, is "for the best interests of the children of divorce." Benedek's job is to investígate and make recommendations to the Circuit Court as to custody, visitation rights and amount of child support and alimony. His office also exercises eneral supervisión over all the children. and determines whether they are getting proper care. "You know," Benedek said the other day, "Emmett Kelly, the clown, says it takes twice as much to make a child laugh today than it did 10 years ago. It s sad And the saddest thing about divorce is that it scars the children." Benedek is an effervescent, good-humored and - as one might expect of a Friend of the Court - a friendly chap He is a happily married man surrounded by marital unhappiness who, one suspects, has carefully cultivated his wit in order to preserve his sanity. He is certainly not the ogre that some alimony payers may fancy him to be from afar. .. About 5,000 county men last year mailI ed Benedek their child support ard alimony checks for the benefit oJ ! more than 10,000 children. Benedek's office m turn distributed "Friend of the Court checks to the mothers. The activities of the office touch on . a lot of Uves in the county. . . "Friend of the Court" derives from the Latin (Amicus Curiae) and has lts origins in English common law. The concept enabled a person or an agency who isn't a party to a suit to enter a case in the public interest, or in this case, on behalf of the children. "This office should be called the 'Friend of the Children,' instead of the 'Friend of the Court,' " says Benedek, an attorney (a gradúate of the U-M Law School) who has been Friend of the Court since 1968. ' Benedek himself has never been divorced. He says he is happily married, to a child psychiatrist whom h e I describes as his "first and last wife I And the Benedeks have four chüdren of I their own. ,. , I How would he feel if his wife divorced I him and took custody of the children? ft "I would be devastated, of course, -How is'Süwn marnage is sol 'Tget a lot of pleasure out of doing 1 things for my wife," says Benedek. 1 'Xshe enjoys doing things tokkel me happy. In marriages which don I work I've noticed that the husband and I wife are always competii They are I reluctant to give to each Each of I them feels like the other is using them. Bnedek says he would liketo J reversal of the divorce rate The family is under attack," he declares but I think the family as an mstitution is worth saving." But, says Benedek, "you can t save the family by making divorce hard to get "Benedek believes that the answer fes in more and better education about mar"age-"especially in mate selectÍ0Benedek believes that marital education should wean people away from the Hollywood and fairy tale notions about marriage and give them "a more realistic idea of what to expect in marriage and what their roles and responsibilities will be. People go into marriage without any realistic idea of what to expect." Benedek is proudest of his office's marriage counseling program which he credits with reconciling many couples who had filed for divorce. Washtenaw was the first county in Michigan to furnish court-connected marriage Not long ago, Benedek hired Donald T Haller, a psychiatrie social worker, as marriage counselor, and "the results that Haller has gotten have been tremendous," says Benedek. "There s no reason why this program can t be expanded to include people before they file for divorce." Says Benedek: "The emotional divorce is the problem. Lots of people are emotionally divorced without being legally divorced." He "Of course, there are some marriages that shouldn't be saved. But there are many others that should be. The new cases handled by Benedek s office were up 20 per cent over the previous year. The Friend of the Court is authorized to carry on proceedings lo enforce all custody and support orders. In cases of delinquency, the office presses for wage assignments (the deduction of support payments by Jie employer). , The office may also seek the arrest of a father who fails to make support payments. About 193 fathers were arrested for failure to make support payments in ,1 1969. "But," says Benedek, "we dont [ like to arrest anyone. We've reduced the ,1 number of our arrests. Besides, ïf we send the father to jail, the state ends up ■ supporting both the father and the motlier. In this county, jail sentences for ■ fathers are virtually unheard of."__ Benëdekiays hls oüice's ■ dations as to whether a divorce should ■ be granted, who should get custody of ■ the children, etc., carry a lot of weight I with the three Circuit Court judges. Benedek reveáis that less than 5 per cent of the fathers are awarded custody of the children, but that, he says is I partly because "most of the fathers I don't ask for custody and most of them feel the kids may be better off with the 1 ay" Benedek: "More often than not, I the mother is better equipped to care tor babies and young children." But Benedek also feels that ït s very sad to find a growing boy without a father" and "I haven't hesitated to I recommend custody by the father if we feel the children would be better off with I "Ú a father wants custody, and he I thinks the children would be better off with him, he could ask for custody and I his chances of getting them are better I than he thinks they are." I The chief complaint of the fathers, he 1 says, is that the mothers are denyrng I them visiting rights. "Even long after ■ the divorce, the game continúes, says 1 Benedek. "A father holds up his check, I and the mother locks the door on his ■ 11 Thifear, Benedek announced, hú; ■ office plans to bring contempt m ings against mothers who deny fathers H B&nedeíf is'in favor of eliminating the j "fault" doctrine from divorce cases. He's also in favor of a recent Michigan Bar Association recommendation that , divorces be granted simply on the I grounds of a "dead marnage. If there is any fault, he says, it often lies on both sides. "An irresponsible I mother is an irresponsible mother; a I deadbeat father is a deadbeat father. I But it's the marriage that's sick. I Taking the fault out of proceedings I has "the advantage of keeping the ■ riage cooler," he says. I Benedek has read the literature which ■ emanates from the numerous divorce I, ., reform organizations that have sprung l. up throughout the área and the nation in I-.;. recent years. Most of the organizations, ;t authorities say, have been formed by I angrv bitter, divorced men who charge that the present system tends to J , a"e divorce, break up families, and ■■, poverish and enslave the father. ■' "Their literature is paranoid as heil, says Benedek, but he allows that their ■ cause may "have a touch of legitima-B Cy(Tomorrow: The Divorce Reformers) i , ;;