Same Sex Partners on Birth Certificates Halted

same sex partnersArkansas Supreme Court Halts Birth Certificates For Same Sex Partners

The Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday temporarily blocked a lower court order that allowed same sex partners throughout the state to be listed as parents on the birth certificates of their children. It let stand the birth certificates obtained by three lesbian couples who had challenged the Arkansas Health Department Vital Statistics Bureau’s refusal to identify the three couples as the adoptive or biological parents of their respective children.

Same sex partners had a previous victory with Little Rock Circuit Judge

They won approval for their listing as parents in a narrow decision by Little Rock Circuit Judge Tim Fox. The same judge then issued another decision extending that recognition statewide. The state appealed the decision that allowed same-sex partners statewide to be listed, saying it conflicted with Arkansas statutes and left birth registrars in legal limbo.

The state Supreme Court agreed and said that “the best course of action is to preserve the status quo with regard to the statutory provisions while we consider the circuit court’s ruling.”

On Dec. 1, Judge Fox held that a state law restricting parentage identification to heterosexual couples was unconstitutional in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision this year legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide.

“(The) decision affords the plaintiffs, as same sex partners, the same constitutional rights with respect to the issuance of birth certificates and amended birth certificates as opposite-sex couples,” Fox wrote at the time.

Click here to read the entire article.

 

Hufingtonpost.com, December 11, 2015 – by Steve Barnes

in Adoption / In the News / Legal  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

Same sex marriage is a constitutional right?

same sex marriage

Federal lawsuit challenges anti-gay North Carolina law allowing magistrates to opt out of same sex marriage

A North Carolina law allowing magistrates with religious objections to stop performing all marriages in order to avoid performing a same sex marriage is unconstitutional, according to a federal lawsuit filed today.

The suit, brought by two same-sex couples and an interracial couple, alleges that Senate Bill 2, passed earlier this year, violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment, and the equal protection and due process clauses of the 14th Amendment.

At least 32 court magistrates in North Carolina have stopped performing marriages under the law, including all four in McDowell County, forcing the state to bring in officials from other areas to serve residents.

“This law distorts the true meaning of religious freedom,” the Rev. Jasmine Beach-Ferrara, executive director of the Campaign for Southern Equality, said in a release announcing the lawsuit. “From the day it was proposed, it is clear that SB2 is about one thing and one thing only — finding a new way to discriminate against same sex marriage.”

The plaintiffs include Carol Ann Person and Thomas Person (above), who were denied the ability to marry in 1976 by magistrates who said it would violate their religious beliefs against interracial marriage. A federal judge later ordered the magistrates to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Loving v. Virginia, but the lawsuit alleges that Senate Bill 2 could allow magistrates to opt out of performing interracial marriages.

Lawmaker approved SB 2, part of a wave of anti-LGBT “religious freedom” legislation across the country, by overriding the veto of Gov. Pat McRory in June. The lawsuit was filed in the same court that struck down North Carolina’s same-sex marriage ban in 2014.

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by John Wright at towleroad.com, December 9, 2015

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Arkansas’ Cautionary Birth Certificate Tale

Birth Certificate

Arkansas’ Cautionary Birth Certificate Tale

It’s been a bumpy week for same-sex parents in Arkansas trying to both get on a child’s birth certificate —but there’s an important lesson in the case for same-sex parents in all states.

A week ago, a Pulaski County circuit judge ruled that the U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized marriage for same-sex couples means that same-sex parents in Arkansas may have both their names put on the birth certificates of children born during their marriages. The state Department of Health, however, initially refused to do so, unsure if the ruling applied beyond the three plaintiffs, and slowed by Attorney General Leslie Rutledge’s advice not to issue amended birth certificates because she planned to appeal. The Department of Health, to their credit, seems to be issuing them anyway.

One important takeaway from all this, though, is found in Judge Tim Fox’s ruling, where he says, “Today’s decision affords the plaintiffs, as same-sex couples, the same constitutional rights with respect to the issuance of birth certificates and amended birth certificates as opposite-sex couples. That is the sum total of the legal effect of this decision.”

Those “same constitutional rights,” however, may be more limited than one might think. Fox notes that the plaintiffs list eight examples of how the lack of both same-sex parents on a birth certificate may impact their legal relationship to their children, including identification procedures for Social Security numbers and passports; denial of rights related to medical care, school-related activities, governmental- or employment-related benefits, survivor benefits, and inheritance; as well as disruption of the parent-child relationship and the award of child support in the event of parental divorce. But, he warns (my bold):

The court’s declaration today does not conclusively resolve any of those legal issues. It may create equitable and legal arguments for resolution of issues that involve only the two spouses of the same sex-marriage, such as child support or child custody. It does not in any manner resolve the multitude of legal issues that may arise involving third parties. Biological parents, mother or father, whose statutory and/or common law rights may not have been properly terminated, whether through an adoption proceeding or by the signature of surrogacy documents, are not bound by the listing of two names on a birth certificate. Other heirs claiming against a same-sex spouse estate, or attempting to disallow a minor child’s interest in the estate of one of the same-sex spouses, are not bound by an amended birth certificate. Insurance companies—life, health, or casualty—may decide in order to prevent potential duplication of claims, or liabilities not actuarially considered in premium calculations, to change their contract language to exclude birth certificates as indicia of acceptable legal relationship, and may require other documentation such as adoption decrees. In the future, government benefits, both state and federal, may key off of legal documentation other than a birth certificate. Today’s decision does not legally resolve any of those potential issues.

Click here to read the entire article.

by Mombian.com, December 8, 2015

in Adoption / In the News / Legal / Second Parent Adoption / Step Parent Adoption  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

Same Sex Couples on Birth Certificates in Arkansas

Same Sex Couples on Birth Certificates Statewide in Arkansas

A state judge ruled on Tuesday that Arkansas must list both members of same sex couples as parents on official birth certificates issued across the state, broadening his earlier finding on behalf of three married lesbian couples with children.

Little Rock Circuit Judge Tim Fox held that a state law restricting parentage identification to heterosexual couples was unconstitutional in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision this year legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide. “(The) decision affords the plaintiffs, as same-sex couples, the same constitutional rights with respect to the issuance of birth certificates and amended birth certificates as opposite-sex couples,” Fox wrote in his decision.

Same sex couples, gay parents, lesbian parents

A spokesman for Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge said she would review Fox’s order before commenting.

“It was a wonderful decision,” said Cheryl Maples, attorney for the plaintiffs. “It was exactly what we wanted.”

The state had resisted identifying same-sex couples as parents on Arkansas birth certificates largely on technical grounds, arguing the protocol was established by the Legislature and the state Health Board and could not be changed without action by either, or both.

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New York Times vis Reuters, December 1, 2015

in In the News / Legal / Parenting  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

Marital presumption discrepancy Wisconsin’s laws

Despite gay marriage legalization, LGBTQ community still struggles with marital presumption laws

One Wisconsin couple tried working their way through the courts to “ungender,: or change marital presumption paternity laws. Wisconsin’s 2nd District Court of Appeals upheld a judge’s decision Nov. 4 to dismiss a gay couple’s request for one partner to become the legal parent of her wife’s child. Marsha Mansfield, a University of Wisconsin law professor, said the court dismissed the request because the couple did not go through the correct legal process. She said they filed their case as an adoption, when they were actually aiming to change the constitutionality of a law.

When they first filed their request, Mansfield said the couple would have needed to notify former Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, an opponent of gay marriage, which they failed to do.

Emily Dudak Taylor, the attorney on the couple’s case, said the Attorney General was present during the process and at the appeal, and the case being filed as an adoption should not have mattered. She said writing the decision off as a simple procedural error was a skewed way of viewing the issue.

“It’s completely unfair and unequal,” Taylor said. “It’s not just a minor procedural issue at all.”

The decision indicates the court’s avoidance of the greater issue at hand, stating that marriage equality has “hit a wall” with implementation on the state level, Taylor said.

She said the goal of her case was to “ungender” the parental presumption of paternity, a law that grants husbands the status of legal parent and placement on the birth certificate of their wives’ children simply by signing a document at the hospital, without investigating how the child was conceived.

The law’s wording needs to be ungendered from husband to spouse, and father to parent, so the parental presumption can also apply to a female spouse, Taylor said.

Currently, since the law only deals with heterosexual couples, it is unclear what gay couples are supposed to do in cases where one partner has a biological child through artificial insemination, Taylor said. Sometimes her wife becomes the legal parent, and sometimes they have to go through an unnecessary adoption process, she said.

Lesbian women shouldn’t have to adopt their own children simply because they were conceived through artificial insemination, Taylor said.

Click here to read the entire article.

 

by Emily Hamer, December 1, 2015, The Badger Herald

in Adoption / In the News / Legal / Parenting / Second Parent Adoption / Step Parent Adoption  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

Gestational Surrogacy Contract Enforced in PA

Surrogacy ContractSuperior Court of PA Rules to Enforce Gestational Surrogacy Contract

In the first ruling of its kind from the Superior Court of Pennsylvania, an appellate level court, the court ruled that a gestational surrogacy contract is enforceable.

This is a great step forward for ethical, regulated surrogacy.  It essentially opens the door a bit wider for couples living in states such as New York, who have not yet embraced regulated surrogacy.  As more becomes available, I will share.  However, if you would like to read the decision, click the link below.

 

Click here to read the opinion.

November 23, 2015

in Ethics / In the News / Legal / Surrogacy  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

California Judge Orders Frozen Embryos Destroyed

embryoFrozen Embryos to be Destroyed Judge Says

In the first decision in California to address a dispute over the fate of frozen embryos after a couple’s divorce, a state judge in San Francisco on Wednesday ordered the destruction of five embryos after a man challenged his ex-wife’s right to use them.

The woman, Mimi C. Lee, a 46-year-old cancer survivor, argued that she would not have another chance to bear biological children. But in 2010, when she and her husband at the time, Stephen Findley, took part in in vitro fertilization, they signed an agreement that the embryos would be destroyed if they ever divorced.

Judge Anne-Christine Massullo of San Francisco Superior Court upheld the agreement.

“Decisions about family and children often are difficult, and can be wrenching when they become disputes,” Judge Massullo wrote. “The policy best suited to ensuring that these disputes are resolved in a cleareyed manner — unswayed by the turmoil, emotion and accusations that attend to contested proceedings in family court — is to give effect to the intentions of the parties at the time of the decision at issue.”

Her ruling is consistent with the pattern across the country. Judges in at least 11 other states, starting with Tennessee in 1992 and including New York and New Jersey, have ruled in post-divorce embryo custody cases. And at least eight of them found in favor of the party who did not want the embryos gestated.

One party’s right not to procreate has usually been considered to trump the other’s right to procreate, said a bioethics professor at the University of California, Davis, School of Law, Lisa Ikemoto — even in cases in which the couples did not sign an agreement as this couple did.

In three states, though, courts have ruled in favor of women who argued that their frozen embryos provided their only chance to have biological children — intermediate appellate courts in Pennsylvania and Illinois and a trial court in Maryland.

Click here to read the entire article.

New York Times, by Andy Newman, November 18, 2015
in Ethics / In the News / Legal / Science  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

Same Sex Parenting: OK Supreme Court Landmark Ruling

Same Sex Parenting Wins Increased Rights in Oklahoma

The Oklahoma Supreme Court on Tuesday issued a landmark ruling same sex parenting increasing the rights of noncustodial parents who have been in same-sex relationships. The decision acknowledged the rights of a non-biological parent in a same-sex relationship who has acted as a parent.

The state’s high court ruled that an Oklahoma County judge improperly dismissed the case of Oklahoma City resident Charlene Ramey. The court reversed that decision and remanded the case for further proceedings so Ramey could pursue a hearing on custody and visitation of the child, who was born in 2005. Ramey was in a same-sex relationship with Kimberly Sutton. At the time of the relationship, Oklahoma did not recognize same-sex marriages, which changed following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last year not to take up an appeal of Oklahoma’s marriage-equality lawsuit ruling.

The couple agreed to have a child, born by Sutton with a donor. Sutton and Ramey later separated after almost 10 years of same sex parenting, as co-parents. Sutton denied Ramey’s status as a parent and sought to end all interaction between Ramey and the child, according to the opinion.

“Ramey, the plaintiff, is not a mere ‘third party’ like a nanny, friend, or relative, as suggested by the district court,” the ruling states. “On the contrary, Ramey has been intimately involved in the conception, birth and parenting of their child, at the request and invitation of Sutton. Ramey has stood in the most sacred role as parent to their child and always been referred to as ‘mom’ by their child.”

The decision is intended to recognize same-sex couples who, prior to the U.S. Supreme Court legalization of same-sex marriage, entered into committed relationships, engaged in family planning with the intent to parent jointly and share those responsibilities, the ruling states.

“Public policy dictates that the district court consider the best interests of the child and extend standing to the non-biological parent to pursue hearings on custody and visitation,” the ruling says.

Click here to read the entire article.

 

by Barbara Hoberock, November 18, 2015 TulsaWorld.com

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Lesbian Couple to Keep Foster Child Utah Judge Shifts Ruling

Utah Judge Reverses Ruling in Favor of Lesbian Couple

A Utah judge on Friday reversed his order to take a foster child away from a lesbian couple because of their sexual orientation, state officials said. The judge, Scott N. Johansen of Juvenile Court, had issued an order on Tuesday saying that the child, a 9-month-old girl, had to be removed from the home of a lesbian couple by the end of the day next Tuesday, and placed with a heterosexual couple.

The foster parents, Rebecca A. Peirce, 34, and April M. Hoagland, 38, and the state Division of Child and Family Services, both filed motions Thursday asking the judge to reconsider, and said they were prepared to appeal his decision. The couple, who are married, lives in Price, southwest of Salt Lake City.A Utah judge on Friday reversed his order to take a foster child away from a lesbian couple because of their sexual orientation

The clash is the first of its kind, said Ashley Sumner, a spokeswoman for the state agency, because Utah only recently began approving foster child placements with same-sex couples, after the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling on gay marriage in June.

Under fire from critics including gay rights activists and the state’s Republican governor, a judge in Utah on Friday reversed, at least temporarily, his order that a foster child be taken away from a lesbian couple because it was “not in the best interest of children to be raised by same-sex couples.”

While the child may remain with the couple for the moment, Judge Scott N. Johansen signaled that the matter might not be settled. He continued to question the placement of children with same-sex parents, a matter that will be taken up at a Dec. 4 hearing on what is in the best interests of this child, a 9-month-old girl.

The judge’s actions, coming after the Supreme Court this year established a right to same-sex marriage, put him at the center of another front in the nation’s legal and culture wars: the question of whether gay men and women can get, and keep, custody of children under various circumstances.

in Adoption / Ethics / Foster / Foster Care / In the News  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

Infertility? Could a Uterus Transplant Help?

ethicsUterus Transplants May Soon Help Some U.S. Women Struggling With Infertility Become Pregnant

Infertility affects millions of women worldwide and in Cleveland within the next few months, surgeons at the Cleveland Clinic expect to become the first in the United States to transplant a uterus into a woman who lacks one, so that she can become pregnant and give birth.

Six doctors swarmed around the body of the deceased organ donor and quickly started to operate. The kidneys came out first. Then the team began another delicate dissection, to remove an organ that is rarely, if ever, taken from a donor. Ninety minutes later they had it, resting in the palm of a surgeon’s hand: the uterus.

The operation was a practice run. The recipients will be women who were born without a uterus, had it removed or have uterine damage. The transplants will be temporary: The uterus would be removed after the recipient has had one or two babies, so she can stop taking transplant anti-rejection drugs.

Uterine transplantation is a new frontier, one that pairs specialists from two fields known for innovation and for pushing limits, medically and ethically — reproductive medicine and transplant surgery. If the procedure works, many women could benefit: An estimated 50,000 women in the United States might be candidates. But there are potential dangers.

The recipients, healthy women, will face the risks of surgery and anti-rejection drugs for a transplant that they, unlike someone with heart or liver failure, do not need to save their lives. Their pregnancies will be considered high-risk, with fetuses exposed to anti-rejection drugs and developing inside a womb taken from a dead woman.

Eight women from around the country have begun the screening process at the Cleveland Clinic, hoping to be selected for transplants. One, a 26-year-old with two adopted children, said she still wanted a chance to become pregnant and give birth.

“I crave that experience,” she said. “I want the morning sickness, the backaches, the feet swelling. I want to feel the baby move. That is something I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember.”

She traveled more than 1,000 miles to the clinic, paying her own way. She asked that her name and hometown be withheld to protect her family’s privacy.

She was 16 when medical tests, performed because she had not begun menstruating, found that she had ovaries but no uterus — a syndrome that affects about one in 4,500 newborn girls. She comes from a large family, she said, and always assumed that she would have children. The test results were devastating.

Dr. Andreas G. Tzakis, the driving force behind the project, said, “There are women who won’t adopt or have surrogates, for reasons that are personal, cultural or religious.” Dr. Tzakis is the director of solid organ transplant surgery at a Cleveland Clinic hospital in Weston, Fla. “These women know exactly what this is about,” he said. “They’re informed of the risks and benefits. They have a lot of time to think about it, and think about it again. Our job is to make it as safe and successful as possible.”

Click here to read the entire article.

 

New York Times, by Denise Grady – November 12, 2015

in Ethics / In the News / Science  by Anthony Brown 0 comments