A man does not have a legal duty of support until there is a court finding that he is the actual father and the court orders support. Id.; and see B. v. Holder, 494 F. Supp. 814, 818 (M.D.Ala. 1980) (Alabama's presumption of legitimacy of child born in wedlock does not establish husband's legal duty of support unless he is in fact the father). The presumption of legitimacy makes it difficult for a man married to a child's mother at the time of conception to refute paternity, however, it is a rebuttable presumption.
It has long been established by Alabama law that a former stepfather is under no legal obligation to support his former minor stepchildren. See Englehardt v. Yung's Heirs, 76 Ala. 534 (1884), as cited in Annette B. v. Holder, 494 F. Supp. 814 (M.D. Ala. 1980). Where the mother marries another, the stepfather does not per se incur an obligation to support her child, but when he takes the child into his family, he puts himself in loco parentis, and has a primary duty, along with the mother, to support the child while such relation exists.