California Recognizes Lesbian Parents’ Rights
The California Supreme Court issued three rulings yesterday stating that lesbian partners who have children while they are a couple are both entitled, and required, to be treated as the children’s parents, regardless of whether they are formally registered as domestic partners. This puts lesbian parents on an equal footing with unmarried heterosexual parents, and means, among other things, that if the couple splits up, both partners are liable for child support.
This is how it should be. “Equal rights, not special rights” has long been a motto of the gay rights movement, and it’s gratifying to see that at least one jurisdiction agrees.
Filed under: Parenting, Politics and Law
[...] This is certainly better than a ruling to the contrary, but doesn’t go as far as California’s August ruling that lesbian partners who have children while they are a couple are both entitled, and required, to be treated as the children’s parents. Nor does it come close to a New Jersey ruling that allowed a lesbian couple to put both the bio and non-bio moms’ names on their child’s birth certificate, without needing an adoption, thus securing both their rights from the moment of birth. [...]
[...] One of my readers has asked about resources for non-bio moms who have lost custody or had their children taken by bio moms. The National Center for Lesbian Rights has published a list of cases involving custody rights, not all of which ruled favorably towards the non-bio mom. They also report on a decision by the Washington State Supreme Court stating that a woman who agrees to have a child with her same-sex partner has all the rights and responsibilities of a legal parent. (This follows a similar California ruling that I wrote about in August.) [...]