¶ 1. This case requires us to consider the constitutional rights of a putative biological father who seeks an order of parentage when a court has already issued a parentage-order determining the minor child’s parents. We conclude that Vermont’s parentage statute does not authorize a court to allow a second parentage action involving a particular child brought by or against a different putative parent unless constitutional considerations require the court to entertain the second parentage case. In this case, even if plaintiff is the genetic parent of the minor child, he does not have constitutionally-protected parental rights. Accordingly, we affirm the trial court’s decision denying plaintiffs motion for genetic testing and dismissing his complaint for establishment of parentage.
¶ 2. J.B. was born in July 2008. On July 1, 2010, the Orleans Superior Court, Family Division, entered a parentage order identifying Buffy Lawton and Joshua Bacon as legal parents of J.B. and a second child, born in January 2010. The parentage order was part of an action to establish child support initiated by the Office of Child Support on behalf of mother. The court enterеd the parentage order based on a stipulation of the parties; the record contains no evidence of any genetic testing or findings to support the order other than the parties’ stipulation. However, the associated June 16, 2010 child support order includes a finding that Ms. Lawton and Mr. Bacon were “living together as an intact [flamily.” 1
¶ 3. Plaintiff Bradley Columbia, representing himself, filed this parentage action against mother in the Orleans Superior Court, Family Division, on August 4, 2010. Plaintiff requested that the court order genetic testing to determine whether plaintiff was the child’s biological father. In his sworn affidavit, plaintiff stated that he had a sexual relationship with mother when she became pregnant with J.B., and that she had told him that he was J.B.’s *169 father. In his affidavit, plaintiff also acknowledged that he did not visit mother and child at the hospital during birth; was not present at the birth of the child; did not offer to pay for an abortion or other medical expenses; was not named on the birth certificate; had not acknowledged his parentage in writing; had not provided food, clothing or financial support for the child; had not lived with the child; had not visited the child; had not sent cards or correspondence to the mother regarding the pregnancy and birth of the child; had not claimed the child on his tax returns; and had not given any gifts to the child. Plaintiff circled “do not know” in response to the question of whether and how the minor child resembled him.
¶ 4. The trial court required plaintiff to join Mr. Bacon as a necessary party before proceeding with the action and, once Mr. Bacon was joined, held a hearing in April 2011. At the hearing, plaintiff reiterated his request for a genetic test. Mr. Bacon took no position on plaintiff’s request, and mother said, “I just want this to be over. ... So whatever will make it be over faster is what I want to happen.” At the hearing, mother testified that plaintiff had not had any contact with J.B. Plaintiff testified that he had a sexual relationship with mother at the time she got pregnant; he did not contradict mother’s testimony that he had no contact with the minor child, and did not offer any other evidence beyond the possible genetic link to support his claim of parentage.
¶ 5. The family court denied the motion for a genétic test and dismissed plaintiff’s case. The court found that “[tjhere was no credible evidence presented at the hearing from which this Court could find that it is reasonably likely that the Plaintiff is the natural father of JB,” acknowledged the prior parentage order establishing Mr. Bacon’s parental status, and noted that plaintiff had had no contact with the minor child. In its conclusions the court stated:
The Plaintiff does not have standing to proceed with this parentage action. . . . Under [15 V.S.A. §] 302(a) a party does not have standing to proceed with a parentage action in a case where the identity of the child’s parent has been previously determined in an action under 15 V.S.A. Section 301 et seq.
The court went on to state that it was-“unable to find that there is a reasonаble probability that the Plaintiff is the father of the *170 minor child,” and that “it is not in the best interest of the child to require that genetic testing occur.” The court thus concluded that good cause existed to exempt the parties and minor child from any obligation to undergo genetic testing. 15 V.S.A. § 304.
¶ 6. Plaintiff timely appealed. In his brief, plaintiff argues that the trial court’s rigid interpretation of 15 V.S.A. § 302(a) violates his right to due process as a putative biological father. Mother, also representing herself, did not file a responsive brief.
¶ 7. Amici for plaintiff argued that the parentage adjudication in Lawton v. Bacon was conclusivе only as to those parties; that the statute should not be construed to require that the winner of a “race to the courthouse” be deemed the legal parent in the face of competing claims; and that the trial court’s dismissal of plaintiffs parentage action violated his due process rights under the United States Constitution.
¶ 8. The Attorney General, as amicus, argued that the trial court was correct in concluding that 15 V.S.A. § 302(a) does not permit a second parentage action once a child’s parentage has been adjudicated, that the statute is constitutional, аnd that in the exceptional case in which application of the statutory prohibition against a second parentage action violates a putative parent’s constitutional rights, Vermont Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b) provides an avenue for relief.
I.
¶ 9. The first question we consider on appeal is whether the trial court was correct in concluding that 15 V.S.A. § 302(a), on its face, does not allow a second parentage action when a court has already issued a parentage order. We review this legal question of statutory interpretation de novo.
Chayer v. Ethan Allen, Inc.,
¶ 10. In pertinent part, § 302(a) provides: “An action to establish parentage
in cases where parentage has not been previously determined either by an action under this subchapter or by adoption,
may be brought by ... a person alleged or alleging himself or herself to be the natural parent of a child . . . .” 15 V.S.A. § 302(a) (emphasis added). “[W]e presume the Legislature intended the plain, ordinary meaning of [the]
*171
statute.”
Benson,
¶ 11. By limiting the availability of a parentage proceeding to cases in which parentage has not previously been established through a separate parentage action or adoption, the Legislature has cast its lot on the side of finality and protection of established parent-child relationships. As we noted in a related context, “Whatever the interests of the presumed father in ascertaining thе genetic ‘truth’ of a child’s origins, they remain subsidiary to the interests of the state, the family, and the child in maintaining the continuity, financial support, and psychological security of an established parent-child relationship.”
Godin v. Godin,
¶ 12. In addition, the Legislature’s restriction on multiple parentage actions reduces the risk of conflicting parentage orders involving the same minor child. In a related context, we have rejected an interpretation of the family law statutes that would allow for competing parentage orders involving the same child. In
Jones v. Murphy
we considered a case in which shortly following
*172
their final divorce order mother and ex-husband filed a stipulation to amend the order to reflect that ex-husband was not the biological father of the sixteen-month-old child born during the marriage, and to expressly hold that ex-husband was not a legal parent.
¶ 13. In the meantime, mother filed a parentage action against the putative father, who stipulated to his parentage subject to his right to appeal the family court’s jurisdiction to entertain a parentage action at all in light of the family court order providing that ex-husband was the legal parent.
Id.
at 87-88,
¶ 14. One amicus for plaintiff argues that the Lawton v. Bacon judgment is not conclusive against plaintiff because plaintiff had no notice of that prior action and did not particiрate. We do not disagree with amicus’s conclusion that res judicata and collateral estoppel do not bar plaintiff’s parentage action. However, the impediment to plaintiff’s claim in this case does not arise from these doctrines; it arises from the terms of the statute itself. Although considerations favoring finality of judgments may under *173 lie both § 302(a) and the judicially-crafted rules regarding collateral attacks on final judgments, these two sources of legal authority are distinct. Nothing in the parentage statute purports to limit the effect of the prohibition of a second parentage judgment concerning the same child to parties who participated in the first proceeding.
¶ 15. Amicus for plaintiff invokes our opinions in
Godin
and
Jones
to support the position that the parentage statute allows a second action involving different parties. In
Godin,
when declining to set aside the parentage judgment in a final divorce order pursuant to a Rule 60(b) motion, we noted in dicta that nothing in our order would “prevent an interested child from later attempting to ascertain the identity of the child’s biological father” by filing a parentage action.
¶ 16. Section 302(a) expressly bars a new parentage action when parentage of a child has previously been established in a parentage action or adoption; the provision is silent about the availability of a parentage action with respect to a child whose parentage has been adjudicated in the context of a divorce action, as in the Godin case. As a consequence, in Godin, we did not consider the impact of the limitation in § 302(a) on the minor child’s possible future initiation of a parentage action. Additionаlly, although we need not reach the issue here, it is not clear that our remark in Godin survives our decision in Jones. In Jones, we expressly rejected a framework that would allow a divorce order adjudicating parentage to stand alongside a separate and inconsistent adjudication in a parentage case, and we insisted on a case flow that ensured that a given child be subject to one and only one court order adjudicating parentage.
¶ 17. Moreover — and, again, we need not decide this question — a child, as opposed to a parent or putative parent, may have independent constitutional protections that require that the child be allowed to pursue an independent parentage action if the child was not a party to the litigation establishing the identity of his or her parents in the first place. See, e.g.,
Johnson v. Hunter,
¶ 18. We note that the Uniform Parentage Act (UPA), and states whose parentage statutes follow the UPA, expressly allow for post-adjudication parentage actions in some circumstances. See 9B U.L.A. Parentage Act § 609(b) (2000) (“If a child has an acknowledged father or an adjudicated father, an individual, other than the child, who is neither a signatory to the acknowledgment of paternity nor a party to the adjudication and who seeks an adjudication of paternity of the child must commence a proceeding not later than two years after the effective date of the acknowledgment or adjudication.”); see, e.g., Wash. Rev. Code § 26.26.540(2) (same, except requiring commencement of proceedings within four years); Tex. Fam. Code Ann. § 160.609(b) (same). The Vermont Legislature has not included such language in Vermont’s parentage law, and we presume it drafted the parentage statute advisedly.
Vt. Human Rights Comm’n v. State,
¶ 19. For the above reasоns, absent a constitutional overlay or exception, we agree that the trial court is not authorized to entertain a parentage action by a putative parent in the face of an existing final judgment of parentage arising from a prior parentage action.
II.
¶ 20. The next question is whether this statutory bar to plaintiff’s parentage action violates his due process rights.
¶ 21. The United States Supreme Court has recognized that “[t]he rights to conceive and to raise one’s children have been deemed ‘essential,’ ‘basic civil rights,’ and ‘rights far more precious than property rights.’ ”
Stanley v. Illinois,
¶ 22. The Supreme Court has also recognized that this due process protection of parental rights does not arise solely by virtue of a genetic connection between parent and child: “Parental rights do not spring full-blown from the biological connection between parent and child. They require relationships more enduring.”
Lehr v. Robertson,
When an unwed father demonstrates a full commitment to the responsibilities of parenthood by coming forward to participate in the rearing of his child, his interest in personal contact with his child acquires substantial protection under the Due Process Clause. At that point it may be said that he acts as a father toward his children. But the mere existence of a biological link does not merit equivalent constitutional protection.
*176 Id. at 261 (quotations omitted).
¶23. A biological connection thus creates the opportunity to establish a parent-child relationship, but is not, by itself, tantamount to parenthood. As the Court went on to explain:
Thе significance of the biological connection is that it offers the natural father an opportunity that no other male possesses to develop a relationship with his offspring. If he grasps that opportunity and accepts some measure of responsibility for the child’s future, he may enjoy the blessings of the parent-child relationship and make uniquely valuable contributions to the child’s development. If he fails to do so, the Federal Constitution will not automatically compel a State to listen to his opinion of where the child’s best interests lie.
Id. at 262. Given that Lehr “never had any significant custodial, personal, or financial relationship” with the minor child, and did not seek to establish a legal tie until after she was two years old, id., the Court concluded that his interests were adequately protected by a statutory scheme that would have provided him notice of the adoption proceedings if he had registered in the “putative father registry.” Id. at 264-65.
¶ 24. Reviewing
post-Lehr
cases, we observed, “most courts and commentators have concluded that the ‘opportunity interest’ [identified in
Lehr]
must be grasped promptly, both before and after the child’s birth, or it will be lost.”
In re C.L.,
¶ 25. In
C.L.,
we upheld the termination of a biological father’s parental rights where the trial court did not make an express finding that the father was unfit to parent the child. The father
*177
did not know about the child’s existence for nine months after the child’s birth, had only had two one-hour visits with the sixteen-month-old and her foster mother prior to the TPR hearing, and was a “virtual stranger to the child, having established no personal or emotional connection with her.”
Id.
¶¶ 5, 17. Upon discovery of his paternity, father had not “[made] every reasonable effort, at the earliest possible date, to seize the оpportunity to establish a parental relationship.”
Id.
¶ 16. Although the context of
C.L.
was different, we relied heavily on our analysis of
Lehr
and its progeny “in helping to identify the unique concerns that arise in a case where the State seeks to terminate the parental rights of a recently discovered father whose only link to a child is biological.”
Id.
¶ 15; cf.
In re S.B.L.,
¶ 26. Although
Lehr
involved the rights of a putative biological father to challenge an existing adoption order through a parentage action, the Court’s constitutiоnal analysis applies with equal force in the context of a challenge to an existing parentage order through a subsequent parentage action. See, e.g.,
R.B.,
¶27. Applying these considerations to this case, we conclude that, even if plaintiff were found by genetic testing to be the child’s biological father, he would not have a constitutionally protected parental interest that trumps the parentage statute’s bar against subsequent parentage cases. Like the father in
Lehr,
plaintiff did not seek to establish a legal tie to the minor child
*178
until more than two years after the child’s birth. Like the father in
Lehr,
plaintiff “never had any significant custodial, personal, or financial relationship” with the minor child.
¶ 28. At oral argument, plaintiff represented that he knew that mother was pregnant, possibly with his child, before the minor child was born; that after the child’s birth he had written mother from jail requesting photos of the child; and that he had held back from pursuing his parentage claim sooner out of fear for mother’s safety. Although these statements are not supported by plaintiffs initial affidavit nor his hearing testimony, and thus are not evidence, these facts would not change our conclusion. If anything, plaintiffs acknowledgment that he knew of mother’s pregnancy before the child was born reinforces our conclusion. This is not a case in which a putative parent did not know or have a way of knowing of the existence of the child. Plaintiffs letters to mother asking for photos of the child showed that plaintiff had an interest in the child, but the request for pictures, without accompanying efforts to take responsibility for the child by establishing a relationship, providing nurturing, offering support, or asserting his legal rights was not enough. And plaintiffs explanation for his inaction, while not unreasonable, does not change the fact that when he did step forward, more than two years after the child’s birth, he could not claim any indicia of parenthood other than, possibly, a genetic connection to the child.
¶ 29. The determination of an individual’s status, or potential status, as a parent requires consideration of a host of factors, including but not limited to a child’s genetic connection, or lack thereof, to a putative parent. 2 Future cases may present closer *179 questions for courts to consider. In this case, given that plaintiff had had no contact or relationship with J.B. — who was nearly three-years old by the time of the trial court’s hearing on plaintiffs motion — he did not formally assert or seek to determine his parentage for more than two years after the child’s birth, he had not assumed any responsibility for the child’s emotional or material well-being, and another legally-adjudicated father had lived in a family relationship with the child, we do not find this to be a close case.
¶ 30. Unless the Legislature adopts the most recent version of the UPA, or otherwise amends the parentage laws to allow a putative parent to seek to establish parentage in the face of an existing parentage order, we recognize that we are left with a situation in which some potential putative parents have a constitutional right to pursue their parentage claims but no clear procedural mechanism for doing so. A party to the initial parentage case can seek to set aside a parentage judgment pursuant to V.R.C.P. 60(b) (applicable in parentage cases through V.R.F.P. 4(a)). See, e.g.,
Godin,
Affirmed.
Notes
At oral argument, mother represented that Mr. Bacon had signed an acknowledgment of parentage at the hospital when J.B. was born, that she and Mr. Bacon had lived together and co-parented J.B. for several years following J.B.’s birth until several months before the December 2011 oral argument, and that she and Mr. Bacon shared contact with their children, including J.B., on a fifty-fifty basis. We cannot treat these statements as evidence, but do take notice of the findings in the June 2010 child support order.
Because father in this ease hangs his hat on a potential genetic link to the minor child, our analysis focuses on the insufficiency of such a link, by itself, to trigger the constitutional rights associated with parenthood. We do not mean to suggest that a genetic link is necessary to a claim of parenthood. We have affirmed a trial court’s refusal to set aside a divorce order affirming husband’s parentage of the minor child presumed to be his for fourteen years, even in the face of a claim that he was not the biological parеnt.
Godin,