## Facts

- Mary Roe, age 20, was a college student who had been supported by her father, John Doe.
- While attending college out of state, Roe moved from a dormitory to an off-campus apartment with a classmate contrary to her father’s instructions and without his knowledge.
- After learning of the move, the father terminated financial support and told Roe to return to New York; she refused.
- Roe sold a car previously given by her father and used the proceeds to cover expenses to finish the academic year and take additional courses.
- On returning to New York, Roe chose to live with a friend’s parents rather than in her father’s home.
- The record reflected family conflict and that Roe was of employable age and mentally competent; there was no finding that she left home due to danger or other necessity.
- A court-appointed guardian brought a Family Court support proceeding seeking an order compelling the father to continue support.

## Issues

1. Whether a parent must continue supporting a minor child who is employable and competent when the child voluntarily and without cause leaves the parent’s home against the parent’s will to avoid parental control.

## Decision

- The New York Court of Appeals affirmed the denial of a support order.
- The court held that a minor of employable age, in full possession of her faculties, who voluntarily and without cause abandons the parental home against the parent’s will to avoid parental control forfeits the right to demand support.
- The court emphasized restraint in intervening in ordinary intra-family conflicts absent a legal violation and declined to use support orders to displace parental authority in such circumstances.

## Legal Principles

- A parent’s legal duty to support a minor child is not absolute; it may be lost when the child repudiates the parental household without justification.
- A competent, employable minor who voluntarily leaves the parental home, without cause, against the parent’s wishes, and to avoid reasonable parental control may be treated as having forfeited entitlement to support (often described as constructive emancipation).
- Courts generally avoid adjudicating routine family disputes in a way that would undermine parental authority where no unlawful conduct necessitates intervention.

## Conclusion

The court concluded that a competent, employable minor who leaves the parental home without cause and in defiance of parental authority to avoid control cannot compel continued parental support, and it therefore affirmed the result denying the requested support order.


Roe v. Doe, 29 N.Y.2d 188, 324 N.Y.S.2d 71, 272 N.E.2d 567 (N.Y. 1971)