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Christocrats try to roll back adoption rights for LGTB parents

How this section is organized: State-by-state sections follow articles of general interest.

Maryland Child Care Workers Voice Support For Gay Families As High Court Prepares To Hear Marriage Case

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, November 30, 2006

(Baltimore, Maryland) In advance of oral arguments before Maryland's high court, prominent Maryland psychologists, social workers, and child welfare advocates spoke out Thursday in support of marriage for same-sex couples.

At a press conference at the Maryland chapter of the National Association of Social Workers, representatives of the professional groups stressed there is extensive, consistent scientific evidence showing that children raised by lesbian and gay couples develop as well as children raised by heterosexual couples.

"The evidence is clear: No matter how you measure it, children raised by same-sex couples are no different from their peers raised by opposite-sex couples. In areas such as social development, psychological functioning, cognitive ability, and adjustment, there is no difference when comparing these kids," said Dr. Paul Clavelle, President of the Maryland Psychological Association. Continue.

Supreme Court Refuses Gay Parent Case

by Gina Holland, Associated Press, 365Gay.com, May 15, 2006

(Washington) The Supreme Court refused Monday to block a gay woman from seeking parental rights to a child she had helped raise with her partner. Continue

Why Courts Are Adopting Gay Parenting

Op-ed article by Dahlia Lithwick, The Washington Post, March 12, 2006

"Around the country, courts are increasingly recognizing that reality, with more generous notions of what 'parenting' and 'family' mean. Critics are launching the predictable counterattack: deriding gay parenting with the same claims they use to attack gay marriage and dismissing any judge who recognizes such relationships as an unprincipled liberal activist. But there's a crucial legal difference between claims that liberal judges are inventing a right to same-sex marriage and inventing a right to same-sex parents: Judges who do the latter are adhering to a bedrock principle of family law." Click here to read the op-ed.

Gay Families Growing

by Beth Shapiro, 365Gay.com, April 25, 2006

A survey by Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications for OpusComm Group an LGBT marketing company, found that 21 percent of lesbians and 5 percent of gay men currently have a child living at home. Two thirds of lesbian households said they plan on adding children to their family in the next three years while only a third of male couples plan on raising children. Click here for the report

More Gays Hope to Adopt

Family advocates say the result could be devastating for children.

Citizen Link (Focus on the Family) April 28, 2006

A new Syracuse University survey has found that two-thirds of lesbians and a third of homosexual men in the U.S. plan to adopt -- a significant increase from four years ago, and the impact of which could be devastating. Continue

Bill Would Block Republicans From Adopting Children

By 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, February 24, 2006

"(Akron, Ohio) An Ohio Democrat is proposing legislation that would prevent Republicans from adopting children, a move aimed at embarrassing the GOP over moves to block gay adoptions. State Sen. Robert Hagan (D-Youngstown) admits his bill is purely 'tongue-in-cheek' but says that the message is anything but a joke." Click here for the report

Arizona

Arizona Anti-Gay Adoption Bill Dies

by 365Gay.com, April 18, 2006

"(Phoenix, Arizona) Legislation that would give married couples preference over single people in adopting children has been narrowly defeated in the Arizona Senate.

"The 15-to-13 vote was one vote shy of the 16 needed for passage with three Republicans joining all ten Democrats present in voting against the measure." The lower house had passed the measure. Click here for the report.

Arkansas

Arkansas AG Rejects Bid For Gay Adoption Ban

Associated Press, 365Gay.com, September 5, 2007

(Little Rock, Arkansas) Arkansas's attorney general said Wednesday he will reject a proposed voter-backed initiative aimed at barring unmarried couples from adopting or fostering children. A conservative group hoped to use the ban to keep gay couples from becoming foster parents.

Attorney General Dustin McDaniel said the proposal submitted by the Arkansas Family Council is inconsistent. He said the group would be allowed to redraft and resubmit it.

"I strongly suspect they will incorporate our changes and maybe a few of their own, resubmit it, and I'll ultimately certify it. But it did not meet the legal requirements to certify it right now," McDaniel said. Continue.

Gay Adoption Ban Proposal Submitted To Arkansas A.G.

365Gay.com, August 24, 2007

(Little Rock, Arkansas) The wording on a proposed ballot measure that would bar gays and lesbians from adopting children has been submitted to the Arkansas Attorney General.

The proposal also would prevent unmarried opposite-sex couples from adopting.

If it is approved by Attorney General Dustin McDaniel the Arkansas Family Council would be able to begin collecting the 61,974 signatures of registered voters needed to have the question put to voters in 2008. Continue.

Parenting ban dies in Arkansas house

Advocate.com, March 28, 2007

A proposal to prohibit Arkansas gay men and lesbians and unmarried couples from becoming foster or adoptive parents failed twice Tuesday before a committee of the state house of representatives, the Associated Press reported.

The proposal, by Republican senator Shawn Womack, failed in the house judiciary committee after no one on the committee moved to pass it. The panel had rejected an amendment Womack offered that would have allowed gays to adopt if they were related to the child. Continue.

Arkansas Reaches Settlement In Dispute With Its Anti-Gay Top Gun

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, January 11, 2007

(Little Rock, Arkansas) Arkansas taxpayers will pay $60,000 for the testimony of a university professor who testified for the state that gays and lesbians are unfit to serve as foster parents.

But it is a far cry from the $200,000 George Rekers had sought.

The Arkansas the Department of Health and Human Services hired George Rekers as an expert witness in the case, brought by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of four couples who wanted to foster parents. Continue.

Arkansas governor wants to keep ban on gay foster parents

The Advocate.com, July 1-3, 2006

One day after the Arkansas supreme court struck down a state ban on gay and lesbian foster parents, Gov. Mike Huckabee on Friday urged the legislature to pass a law reinstating the ban. "I'm very disappointed that the court seems more interested in what's good for gay couples than what's good for children needing foster care," Huckabee told the Associated Press through his spokeswoman, Alice Stewart.

The state supreme court on Thursday upheld a lower court decision that threw out a ban on gays and lesbians serving as foster parents. Four people sued after the policy was put into effect in 1999. The state Child Welfare Board dropped the policy after losing a court fight in 2004. Continue

California

San Francisco's Catholic Charities develops plan to allow adoptions by gays

AP, Advocate.com, August 04, 2006

The social services arm of the archdiocese of San Francisco announced Wednesday that it has found a way to help connect hard-to-place children with welcoming parents, gay or straight, without violating the Catholic Church's views on homosexuality. By partnering with another adoption service, San Francisco's Catholic Charities will increase the number of children that find homes without it having to directly place kids with same-sex couples, said the agency's executive director, Brian Cahill.

California Kids Connection, a statewide adoption exchange set up by the Oakland-based nonprofit Family Builders by Adoption, features information about 500 children on a Web site that prospective parents can browse. Workers at the adoption service had to limit the number of children they work with because of limited staffing, but with the help of three Catholic Charities employees who will be placed there, they'll be able to handle more cases, said San Francisco archbishop George Niederauer. Continue

SF Supervisors Sued Over Gay Adoption Support

by Mark Worrall, 365Gay.com, April 4, 2006

"A conservative legal group filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday over a resolution passed unanimously by San Francisco's Board of Supervisors that chastised the Catholic Church over threats to bar gays and lesbians from adopting.

"The suit was filed by the Michigan-based Thomas More Law Center on behalf of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights and two San Francisco Catholic citizens." Click here for the report.

Local Catholic Hierarchy in Disarry Over Ban On Gay Adoption

By Joe Dignan, San Francisco Bay Times, March 23, 2006

"Whether San Francisco�s gays and lesbians will be allowed to adopt children through city-funded Catholic Charities seems now to depend on who you ask.

"Two weeks ago new Vatican Number Two and former San Francisco Archbishop William Levada issued a directive instructing San Francisco�s Catholic adoption agency that it must follow church doctrine and ban adoptions by gays and lesbians. Gay Catholic Supervisor Tom Ammiano wrote, and on Tuesday the Board of Supervisors unanimously passed, a resolution demanding that the group give up the planned ban, which would violate both city and state law, or face a loss of city funding.

"This week Catholic Charities� head Brian Cahill assured Ammiano that the group would retain its current policy of allowing gays to adopt, so Ammiano has backed down, for now, on his threat pull the plug on the group�s city contracts, which make up about 70 percent of its budget. All�s well that ends well? Well, not quite." Continue

Colorado

Gay Civil Rights, Joint Adoption Laws Go Into Effect In Colorado

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, August 3, 2007

(Denver, Colorado) Legislation allowing same-sex couples to jointly parent children and civil rights protections against discrimination went into effect Friday in Colorado.

It makes the state the 10th to allow gay couples to adopt and the 20th to provide civil rights protections to gays and lesbians.

Colorado law already barred discrimination in hiring, firing or in demotions or promotions based on race, age or disability. The new law adds sexuality to those categories. Continue.

Colorado Gay Adoption Bill Passes

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, April 11, 2007

(Denver, Colorado) Legislation that would allow Colorado same-sex couples to adopt passed in the Senate Wednesday despite a flurry of attacks by Republicans.

"This is a remake of the homosexual agenda," warned Sen. Scott Renfroe (R). Continue.

Florida

Florida Gay Adoption Bill Falters

by The Associated Press, 365Gay.com, March 9, 2006

"A bill that would let gay foster parents adopt children already in their care is faltering, but two lawmakers and advocates tried to drum up support for it Thursday before two committees. A group of social workers, child advocates, foster parents and clergy members came to the Capitol to support a bill (SB 172) that would modify Florida's decades-old ban against gay adoption." Click here for the report.

Georgia

Lesbian Regains Custody Of Child

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, May 21, 2007

(Atlanta, Georgia) After almost three months, a seven-year-old girl has been reunited with the woman in whose care she'd thrived for almost a year before a court ordered she be sent to live in a foster home.

The child had been held in foster care by the Wilkinson County Division of Family and Children Services since February 20, when a judge took her away from her home after he learned that she was being raised by a lesbian. Continue.

Indiana

High Court in Indiana Lets Stand Ruling for Joint Gay Adoptions

New York Blade, August 14, 2006

Indiana�s Supreme Court let stand a ruling Aug. 4 that allows unmarried couples, including those of the same sex, to adopt children through a joint petition that gives both partners equal custody. Continue

Indiana A.G. To Appeal Pro-Lesbian Adoption Ruling

by The Associated Press 365Gay.com, May 15, 2006

(Indianapolis, Indiana) The state attorney general's office will ask the Indiana Supreme Court to overturn a ruling allowing unmarried couples, including those of the same sex, to adopt children through a joint petition that gives both partners equal custody. Continue

Indiana Lawmaker Seeks To Ban Gay Adoption

by 365Gay.com, May 11, 2006

(Indianapolis, Indiana) An Indiana state senator said Thursday he will introduce a bill that would bar same-sex couples from adopting.

Sen. Jeff Drozda (R-Westfield) said the legislation would end what he called confusion in the courts. Drozda said that because current state adoption laws do not specifically prevent same-sex couples from adopting some judges approve same-sex co-parenting while others do not. Continue

Massachusetts

Romney files 'religious freedom' bill on church and gay adoption

By Brooke Donald, The Boston Globe, March 15, 2006

"Gov. Mitt Romney filed a bill Wednesday that would exempt the Boston Archdiocese's Catholic Charities from a state anti-discrimination law that says it must provide adoption services to gay and lesbian couples.

"The social services arm of the Roman Catholic Church has arranged adoptions for the state for about two decades and has placed 13 children in same-sex homes. Last week, however, the agency said it would end its entire adoption program because state laws that forbid discrimination against gay couples run counter to church teachings on homosexuality." Click here to read the report

Taking the gay insults personally

By Ellen Goodman, The Boston Globe, March 24, 2006

"Once again, we are back to the subject of gay adoption. This month, Catholic Charities in Boston was called on the Vatican carpet. For years the agency had operated a kind of ''don't ask, don't tell" policy. Over the course of two decades, Catholic social workers had placed 13 children with gay parents, saving most from the revolving door of foster care.

"But Roman Catholic law forbids gay adoption, and Massachusetts state law forbids discrimination. Faced with a conflict, the bishops overrode the board of Catholic Charities and ended its long and cherished role in adoption." Click here to read the column

Missouri

Dropping Case Won't Mean Gay Fostering Missouri Agency Warns

by The Associated Press, 365Gay.com, June 9, 2006

(Jefferson City, Missouri) Gay rights and children's advocates in Missouri are praising the attorney general's decision to drop a legal fight over gay foster parents, but the state agency said the battle isn't over. Continue

New Hampshire

N.H. Gay Adoption Roulette

by The Associated Press, 365Gay.com, April 10, 2006

"Although the state Legislature repealed a ban on gay adoptions in 1999, gay parents in some counties cannot adopt a partner's children because of varying interpretations of the law by probate judges." Continue

Oklahoma

Appeals Court Rules Anti-Gay Oklahoma Law Unconstitutional

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, August 4, 2007

(Denver, Colorado) The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, sitting in Denver, has upheld a lower court ruling that struck down an Oklahoma law described as being so extreme it had the potential to make children adopted by same-sex couples in other states legal orphans when the families are in Oklahoma.

''We hold that final adoption orders by a state court of competent jurisdiction are judgments that must be given full faith and credit under the Constitution by every other state in the nation,'' the 10th Circuit said in its ruling.

''Because the Oklahoma statute at issue categorically rejects a class of out-of-state adoption decrees, it violates the Full Faith and Credit Clause'' of the U.S. Constitution. Continue.

Federal Court Mulls Oklahoma Anti-Gay Adoption Law

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff, November 14, 2006

(Denver, Colorado) A federal appeals court is weighing the constitutionality of barring same-sex couples in Oklahoma from being adoptive parents.

In May a lower court struck down the law in a 31 page ruling that was highly critical of the state legislature for passing the measure.

The Adoption Invalidation Law, hastily passed at the end of the 2004 Oklahoma legislative session, had said that Oklahoma "shall not recognize an adoption by more than one individual of the same sex from any other state or foreign jurisdiction." Continue.

Judge Strikes Down Okla. Gay Adoption Law

By Tim Talley, The Houston Chronicle, May 20, 2006

OKLAHOMA CITY - A federal judge struck down a 2-year-old law that prohibits Oklahoma from recognizing adoptions by same-sex couples from other states and countries.

U.S. District Judge Robin Cauthron ruled Friday the measure violated due process rights under the U.S. Constitution because it attempted to break up families without considering the parents' fitness or the children's best interests. Continue

Oklahoma Anti-Gay Adoption Law Struck Down

by 365Gay.com, May 19, 2006

(Oklahoma City, Oklahoma) A federal court Friday struck down an Oklahoma law described as being so extreme it had the potential to make children adopted by same-sex couples in other states legal orphans when the families are in Oklahoma.

Although single gays may become the parent of adoptive children same-sex couples are barred from adopting and law allowed the state to invalidate adoptions where couples have been awarded joint parenting rights in states where co-adoption is legal.

In a 31 page ruling the court was highly critical of the state legislature for passing the law. Continue

Washington

Supreme Court Refuses Gay Parent Case

by Gina Holland, Associated Press, 365Gay.com, May 15, 2006

(Washington) The Supreme Court refused Monday to block a gay woman from seeking parental rights to a child she had helped raise with her partner. Continue