From Prashad v. Copeland: “[Ms.] Prashad, [Mr.] Copeland, and [Mr.] Spivey entered into a surrogacy agreement in Minnesota. Prashad was artificially inseminated with the sperm of both Copeland and Spivey. As a result, A.C.C. was born in Minnesota on August 10, 2004. Copeland was listed on the birth certificate as A.C.C.’s father, even though no DNA test had verified biological paternity at that time.” Eventually, as a result of the litigation, a paternity test was done and “Spivey was determined to be the biological father of A.C.C.”
At first, the parties got along, with Copeland and Spivey raising the child but Prashad sometimes visiting the child (who was living in North Carolina with Copeland and Spivey). Eventually, though, Prashad sought custody of the child. The North Carolina court entered an order under which “Copeland and Spivey were awarded primary legal and physical custody of A.C.C.; Prashad was awarded secondary legal and physical custody.” Copeland and Spivey later moved to Virginia, and Prashad sought custody again, claiming custody in preference to Spivey, and asserting that Copeland could have no parental rights at all.
The Virginia Court of Appeals held that the North Carolina order must stand, on full faith and credit principles. But then it had to deal with Prashad’s objection that recognizing the same-sex couple’s parenting rights was barred by the federal Defense of Marriage Act, and by Virginia constitutional and statutory provisions that barred recognition of same-sex marriages or civil unions; here, for instance, is the relevant constitutional provision:
That only a union between one man and one woman may be a marriage valid in or recognized by this Commonwealth and its political subdivisions. This Commonwealth and its political subdivisions shall not create or recognize a legal status for relationships of unmarried individuals that intends to approximate the design, qualities, significance, or effects of marriage. Nor shall this Commonwealth or its political subdivisions create or recognize another union, partnership, or other legal status to which is assigned the rights, benefits, obligations, qualities, or effects of marriage.
The court rejected Prashad’s argument; here’s an excerpt that captures the court’s general view:
like Virginia, North Carolina does not recognize same sex marriage. Furthermore, the only reference to Copeland and Spivey’s homosexual relationship appears in the November 2, 2005 order establishing that North Carolina had jurisdiction over the matter. It is highly illogical that the North Carolina court granted Copeland’s custodial rights based on a relationship that the State of North Carolina does not recognize and that the North Carolina court does not acknowledge in its orders….[I]t is readily apparent that the North Carolina court determined that Copeland’s custodial rights arose out of the fact that he has a legitimate interest in A.C.C. for purposes of custody and visitation, and not from his relationship with Spivey being treated as a marriage under the laws of North Carolina. In light of the fact that Copeland has a legitimate interest in A.C.C., we cannot say that registration of the custody orders is “tacit” recognition of Copeland and Spivey’s relationship.
Sounds exactly right to me. It’s true that most parenting relationships arise within a marriage, and while most court orders determining parental rights happen as a result of the breakup of a marriage. But parenting rights and marital rights are legally quite different. Unmarried opposite-sex couples generally have much the same parental rights as do married couples (setting aside some special problems of proof), and the same access to child custody adjudications. There’s no reason to read bans on same-sex marriage as precluding the recognition of same-sex couples’ custody rights.
tamerlane says:
The poor child!!! No matter which of these bozos winds up pretending to raise him the odds seem to be against his growing up into a well-adjusted adult.
December 5, 2009, 12:13 pmGabriel Malor says:
tamerlane, you base this observation on what? The kid’s got two loving parents with a third waiting in the wings. Seems like she’s going to have as much chance of growing up into a “well-adjusted adult” as anybody.
Oh, and yes, I said “she.” A.C.C. is a girl, which you would have known if you’d even bothered to look at the court’s order.
December 5, 2009, 12:55 pmRob F says:
In May 2007, Dale Carpenter published a column where he demonstrated that various court decisions and laws passed to work around prohibitions on same-sex marriage actually threaten different-sex marriage. Would this decision be in the same category as the ones Carpenter discusses in his column and therefore “erode incentives to marry”?
December 5, 2009, 1:02 pmGuy says:
Remember, banning gay marriage is all for the benefit of the children!!
December 5, 2009, 1:45 pmRandy says:
Rob F, I would say yes. Obviously, according to this court, a couple doesn’t need to be actually married, or even civil unioned, to obtain joint custody of the child. This would apply to both same sex couple and opposite sex couples.
As others have made the point, continuing to oppose SSM means that you are actaully weakening the ties for marriage in general. People will grow up to see that gay couples can live happily and long lives, and even raise children and have the ideal family without getting married. That is a powerful example to be set, and so the lesson is learned: Marriage simply isn’t necessary any more.
Now, personally I disagree with that message. But if you force gay couples to not get married, you will find that we are a resourceful lot, and we will find a way to, as Tim Gunn says, “make it work.” Gays are often trendsetters in society in any case, and so we are teaching a whole new generation that marriage isn’t necessary. If that’s the message you want, then continue to oppose SSM. If it isn’t, then you should be doing what you can to force gay couples to marry to avoid this very situation.
Tamarlane: “The poor child!!!”
If you are that concerned, perhaps you should offer to adopt ACC? I’m sure you would make a much better parent than any gay person, right?
December 5, 2009, 1:49 pmJdog says:
Sure. That said, the legalities aside, this is a small step in increasing recognition of same-sex unions. It’s hard to see how a court that accepted the (wrong-headed, IMHO) notion that they’re wrong and evil wouldn’t have found some way around it.
December 5, 2009, 2:28 pmsk says:
Is that a legally reasonable argument? We hold x in Virginia, under Virginia law, because x was held in North Carolina?
Sk
December 5, 2009, 3:08 pmtheobromophile says:
Randy, as much as I agree with this argument in general, this particular situation is a perfect example of the exact opposite. Custody battles that involve several states, three people who all claim to be parents, and a child who does not live with a single biological parent who is listed on the birth certificate all indicate that this is a bad situation.
Yes, ACC could turn out to be fine. Yes, married heterosexual parents sometimes mess up in child-rearing. Neither situation, though, makes this one acceptable.
December 5, 2009, 3:31 pmGuy says:
Are you familiar with the Full Faith and Credit clause? Yes, DOMA abridges it (in a way that I doubt is constitutional), but it’s pretty clearly implicated here.
December 5, 2009, 3:40 pmSQFreak says:
Under the Full Faith and Credit Clause, I would argue that Virginia has to give full effect to an order of a North Carolina court, even if the same conclusion could not be reached under Virginia law. They would not be fulfilling their constitutional duty if they collaterally attacked the North Carolina court’s decision. They’re not making a holding under Virginia law; they’re stating that the federal law that allows Virginia to refuse to recognize a North Carolina marriage if they feel like it doesn’t apply here.
It may be worth noting that North Carolina does not have a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage while Virginia does. North Carolina does define marriage as being “created by the consent of a male and female person who may lawfully marry . . . .” N.C. Gen. Stat. § 51-1.
December 5, 2009, 3:41 pmptt says:
Why gay couples, especially those with children, would choose to reside in Virginia is beyond me.
And, yes, I am aware that the Cheney-Poes do so. Ooops. Make that Cheney and Poe. They don’t hyphenate their names.
December 5, 2009, 3:42 pmDavid Nieporent says:
You mean a North Carolina child custody decision. Marriage had nothing to do with it.
December 5, 2009, 3:45 pmCornellian says:
I think the decision is exactly correct. Copeland had custody rights independent of his relationship with Spivey, ergo Virginia had to recognize them despite not recognizing same-sex marriage. The harder question would be if Copeland had custody right only through his relationship with Spivey.
I also agree with ptt – no gay couple should choose to live in Virginia, at least without recognizing that doing so puts all their legal arrangements in jeopardy. That draconian provision in the state constitution could potentially threaten any legal relationship between two people of the same sex, not just custody arrangements.
December 5, 2009, 3:48 pmGuy says:
No, what SQFreak said is correct, the fact that it wasn’t a marriage decision is precisely why DOMA doesn’t apply.
December 5, 2009, 3:50 pmRandy says:
Theo: “Custody battles that involve several states, three people who all claim to be parents, and a child who does not live with a single biological parent who is listed on the birth certificate all indicate that this is a bad situation.”
Adopted children are raised by two people who are not on the birth certificate all the time, and I wouldn’t suppose you would label that a ‘bad situation’, would you? Two states are involved, not ‘several’, and how does that have any bearing on how ACC will be raised? Families move all the time, unless you are now arguing that good families should never move out of state.
so the only issue here is that three people want to raise the child instead of just two. And the issue is now resolved. What would you consider to be a better solution?
“Neither situation, though, makes this one acceptable.”
Acceptable to whom? There are thousands of children in this country that go to bed hungry. In my opinion, that’s unacceptable as well. Which is why I donate money to charities that feed children.
What’s even more interesting about this case is that the gay couple found a way to have a child. In a few states, there are laws against gay parents from adopting. So by preventing gays from adopting, they are forced into these sorts of situations. We’ll see these types of cases more and more as gays choose to have families, and it really doesn’t matter if you find it acceptable or not.
December 5, 2009, 4:04 pmRyan Waxx says:
This seems like a slam-dunk case. DOMA isn’t some blanket “gays have no rights” law, and neither side of the debate should treat it as such. This case illustrates why.
December 5, 2009, 4:06 pmGuy says:
Correct, it’s a very carefully targeted “gays have no rights” law.
December 5, 2009, 4:12 pmDavid Nieporent says:
Right; I completely misread what SQFreak said. Oops.
December 5, 2009, 4:28 pmEugene Volokh says:
Guy: Precisely the point — it’s a carefully targeted law that says that people who are in a same-sex marriage do not have the right to have that marriage recognized under federal law or under the law of other states. But it does not keep gays and lesbians from having other rights more broadly, including the right to recognition of out-of-state child custody orders.
December 5, 2009, 4:41 pmConnie says:
Waiting for J.H. to show up and blather about conception rights in three . . . two . . .
December 5, 2009, 4:47 pmCornellian says:
Guy: Precisely the point — it’s a carefully targeted law that says that people who are in a same-sex marriage do not have the right to have that marriage recognized under federal law or under the law of other states. But it does not keep gays and lesbians from having other rights more broadly, including the right to recognition of out-of-state child custody orders.
The Federal DOMA states this in two sections, one for the no federal recognition and one for the state-to-state non-recogition. In my opinion, the first should be repealed, since the Feds should not refuse to recognize a marriage that a state considers valid. The second second doesn’t actually change the law, in my view. I don’t think states are required to recognize out-of-state marriages under FF&C even in the absence of DOMA.
December 5, 2009, 4:57 pmGuy says:
I don’t think we disagree at all on this. My response to Ryan Waxx was merely intended to dispel any impression, that someone might have gotten from reading his comment, that gays don’t have a legitimate grievance with DOMA.
December 5, 2009, 5:15 pmyankee says:
It threatens any legal relationship between an unmarried couple, same-sex or not. If an opposite-sex couple doesn’t want to marry for whatever reason, but wants to set up some wills and powers of attorney to give their relationship some legal force, those documents all are invalid in Virginia if they “intend to approximate the design, qualities, significance, or effects of marriage.”
December 5, 2009, 8:42 pmRyan Waxx says:
My only question is where did YOU get that impression?
December 5, 2009, 8:55 pmjrose says:
Now, that we have dispensed with the easy case, what would happen if the ruling were based on the couple’s status as being married (assume they came from Massachusetts)? What rules? The exacting Full Faith and Credit given to a final judgment. Or Congress’ ability to prescribe the effect of Full Faith and Credit through DOMA?
December 5, 2009, 9:47 pmsubpatre says:
Yankee claims: “… those documents all are invalid in Virginia if they “intend to approximate the design, qualities, significance, or effects of marriage.”
Well, “yes” if your intention is to subvert the state Constitution, the documents are invalid. But if your intention is survivorship, POA, orderly transfer and disposition of custody, property ownership, etcetera; then Yankee’s claim is simply untrue.
The heterophobic claimed all this prior to the Amendment’s passage too, and are repeatedly proven wrong. Hundreds of domestic violence cases fairly enforced, then Miller-v-Jenkins, and now this case proves that Virginia fairly and equitably enforces the law.
Virginia will not “create or recognize another union, partnership, or other legal status that intends to approximate” OR “to which is assigned the rights, benefits, obligations, qualities, or effects of marriage”.
The state will not recognize a status —no matter what you label it— that assigns traditional marital rights; a relationship that effects to be or purports to be marriage.
However, if people want to contract with each other, Virginia both recognizes and vigorously enforces. Wills and POA in this particular state are far-reaching and powerful instruments; advanced medical directives, survivorships and living wills are common and may be written broadly and liberally. Unlike Rhode Island’s (and Massachusetts’) nanny-state mandates that had Dale Carpenter begging for yet more laws, Virginia has always simply and clearly enforced designation of burial arrangements.
December 6, 2009, 12:57 amCornellian says:
Now, that we have dispensed with the easy case, what would happen if the ruling were based on the couple’s status as being married (assume they came from Massachusetts)? What rules?
I think an even better case would be a person who lives in Massachusetts, is married to someone of the same sex, dies without a will, owns real property in Virginia and has no other living relatives. Will the property go to the same-sex spouse, or will Virginia seize the property for itself in the name of traditional values?
December 6, 2009, 12:59 amsubpatre says:
Cornellian writes: “. . . I think an even better case would be a person who lives in Massachusetts, is married to someone of the same sex, dies without a will, owns real property in Virginia and has no other living relatives. Will the property go to the same-sex spouse, or will Virginia seize the property for itself in the name of traditional values?
That’s easy: the person owning the Virginia property ‘willed’ it to the state (though probably to their next of kin) since they know Virginia is prohibited from recognizing the Massachusetts “marriage”. If you want your Virginia property to succeed you, then you designate it.
It is not much different than live-ins where one is simply separated from their spouse. The undivorced spouse, not the live-in, inherits.
“[D]ies without a will, owns real property” says it all: Stoopid.
December 6, 2009, 1:51 amRandy says:
subpatre: “f you want your Virginia property to succeed you, then you designate it.”
All true. However, if a gay couple leaves property in a will to the married spouse, and they were married in MA, then in VA the spouse gets the property. The difference is that a hetero couple get the property tax free because spousal inheritance laws, whereas the gay surviving spouse must pay tax upon it.
So yes, it’s still very unequal treatment under the law. and that’s not even to mention whether the hetero couples have to actually have a will in order to inherit, whereas the gay couple must have one.
December 6, 2009, 12:21 pmLymis says:
Hardly. It proves that Virginia can be strongarmed into it when forced to by other states.
December 6, 2009, 12:36 pmreadery says:
There’s a long history of occassional liberal decisions by lower-court judges getting overturned on appeal or by the legislature. Pulliam v. Smith is itself an example of such a case; so was Cannon v. Miller. A third example is that a 1995 law that in divorce cases where marital misconduct is alleged, either party has a right to a jury trial to decide the misconduct case – the legislature was worried about liberal judges ignoring the law and taking the matter out of their hands.
North Carolina law is fairly clear that biological parents have a constitutional right to a relationship with their child that cannot be interfered with by third parties or by state judges who happen to like third parties better.
This was a Virginia case, not a North Carolina case.
Pierce v. Society of Sisters would have been an easy case if the state could simply declare public school teachers to be the parents of any child whose biological parents want to send him or her to private school. If the state has power to “recognize the parental rights” of whomever it chooses and declare that person a parent simply because it thinks the idea of that person being a parent is a good idea, then children belong to the state plain and simple; their real parents merely have them on sufferance.
December 6, 2009, 8:45 pmreadery says:
It’s worth noting that in this case the only party disputing the matter is Prashad, and Spivey, the father, is not objecting to the situation.
Were Spivey to object to Copeland the matter would be different; without such an objection, Copeland is in some sense acting in Spivey’s stead.
Pulliam v. Smith permits judges to consider homosexual or other extramarital sexual conduct in the home as an improper influence on children and negative factor in custody and reversed a lower-court purporting to hold they can’t, but it doesn’t require them to regard it as the only factor or the controlling factor in every case.
December 6, 2009, 8:53 pmTim says:
I don’t understand why Copeland has any bearing on the case whatsoever. He hasn’t donated any genetic material to the kid and he’s no more a “parent” of that child than I am. Seems to me that whatever dispute exists, it exists between Spivey and Prashad–the parents. Copeland’s name was placed on the birth certificate, but it appears factual and undisputed that doing so was an error.
It seems unclear to me as to why Copeland’s name exists in any court case/documentation with respect to custody. This child has only two parents, Spivey and Preshad. Whatever the court determines with respect to custody should be related to these two parties.
What happens if Spivey and Copeland break up? Who has a legitimate custody claim then?
It doesn’t seem as though this particular court decision relates to anything except revisiting the previous (N.C.) case which of course, affirming it on full faith and credit grounds is proper. But I wonder how or why Spivey and Copeland’s homosexual relationship is relevant to any of these questions. Regardless of who Spivey is with now, he’s the father of that child. Even if the laws changed tomorrow and Spivey and Copeland were married, it’d make not a bit of difference to that fact.
December 7, 2009, 12:10 amsubpatre says:
Randy writes: “The difference is that a hetero couple get the property tax free because spousal inheritance laws…”
Not true., there is no joint tenancy survivorship in Virginia, although the same effect may be specified by direction.
.
Randy continues “So yes, it’s still very unequal treatment under the law. and that’s not even to mention whether the hetero couples have to actually have a will in order to inherit, whereas the gay couple must have one.”
Very unequal? Get real. Unlike your suggestion, normal inheritance —based on thousands of years experience— does not ‘give a spouse the estate’. You’ll next be arguing for automatic disinheritance of children from prior marriages, liasons or relationships of a (now) gay couples.
Dying without a will while owning real property is
December 7, 2009, 12:36 amstoopidnot smart, and requiring a will to effect a disposition is not “very unequal”. Ridiculous claims, especially a continual litany of such claims (see Lymis’ “the other states made them do it”) do not help the gay cause.theobromophile says:
Randy: other children aren’t the issue; they are red herrings, though, designed to ignore the real problem.
If this issue is so “resolved,” why does it take a bloody court battle to resolve it? If all parties are in joyful harmonious agreement, why did it end up in court to begin with? This is dysfunctional, Randy, whether or not a court ultimately settled the issue to your satisfaction.
It’s also dysfunctional because of the unorthodox manner in which that child was brought into this world. When three people decide to be parents but they don’t actually want to be parents together, there’s going to be problems – and the child will pay.
What I find to be eternally galling about these issues is the incessant focus on parental rights, as if the child is like a house in an alimony suit. Ab initio, the best thing that could happen to this child is two homes, two sets of parents, and, apparently, parents who don’t really want to be parents together. As any child of divorced parents can tell you, it’s not the end of the world, but it really sucks. Why anyone would deliberately go into that situation is beyond me; apparently, though, they missed Rule #1 of parenting: it’s not all about you.
December 7, 2009, 1:15 amRicardo says:
Because some states don’t wish to give surrogacy contracts the same status as other contracts. This would equally be an issue in a heterosexual marriage where the woman cannot bear children and has a surrogate mother carry the baby to term.
If you want a really dysfunctional scenario, Google “Baby Manji.” In this case, a Japanese couple paid a surrogate mother in India to give birth to their baby. During the course of the pregnancy, the married Japanese couple split up and the wife decided she didn’t want a child after all while the husband did. When the baby was born, the Indian government stranded the baby in India for a while since Indian law prohibits single men — which the “father” was at this point — from adopting children in India.
Surrogacy agreements seem to present all kinds of legal problems but these problems are quite independent of any movement for gay marriage.
Tim, Minnesota law allows an unmarried man to sign a Recognition of Parentage form establishing he is the father under law of a newly born child. According to this, paternity can be contested after signing the form but only within a certain period of time and under certain conditions. After that, the man’s paternity is final under the law. Presumably, Copeland was the one who signed the ROP. Since father’s who adopt can have their names attached to an adopted child’s amended birth certificate, there’s nothing all that strange about this.
December 7, 2009, 3:04 amTim says:
If I presume this to be true, it seems that such an agreement is an atrocity to father’s parental rights. My moral intuition suggests that is is totally unacceptable for a father’s paternity rights to be subjected to some strange sort of “statute of limitations.”
Your post does, however, clearly indicate why Copeland has any claim at all. If what you say is true, it’d seem that Spivey has no legally relevant claim.
No matter which position is assumed true, Copeland and Spivey’s relationship is irrelevant. Whichever one has legally recognizable parental rights, it’d seem, is in the position to claim custody of the child. That they’re in a relationship that the government refuses to recognize, that they happen to be homosexuals, etc., is irrelevant to the analysis as far as I’m concerned. Perhaps I’m missing another piece of the puzzle here.
Thanks for your update, though, as that definitely filled in a few unanswered questions for me.
December 7, 2009, 4:37 amRicardo says:
Tim, I suppose it’s a matter of what you think the objective of the law should be. If it is to ensure that the man who is the father by genetics have parental rights, then the law is obviously inappropriate. If it is to provide some stability in the paternal relationship between father and child, then laws like these do a lot of good.
Imagine if you are in an unmarried relationship with a girl, she gets pregnant and you agree to take responsibility for the child even without a paternity test. If it turns out you are not the birth father years later, what should happen? Should the “real” father get to interfere in your family and relationship by demanding partial custody? Should you be able to walk away and disclaim all responsibility for the child (maybe you say yes to this but isn’t it the responsibility of the man in the relationship to have a paternity test if there are any doubts)? It seems to me allowing either is unfair to the child who needs stability above all else. And granting partial custody to a birth father years after the fact can destroy a relationship. Any disputes about paternity ought to be resolved as early as possible.
December 7, 2009, 5:45 amegd says:
I think you’re right that the Copeland-Spivey relationship has no bearing on this situation.
And as the court laid out, the custody decision wasn’t based on the relationship between Copeland and Spivey, and therefore neither the DOMA nor the VMA were at issue in this case.
Were the parties smart about this, they would have treated it as a traditional surrogacy and asked the mother to forfeit her parental rights to the child and then have Spivey & Copeland separately adopt the child (or determine paternity and have Copeland adopt the child).
Altogether, not entirely as serious a case as made out by the OP.
December 7, 2009, 10:15 amhazemyth says:
theobromophile:
I appreciate and agree with your emphasis on the child’s welfare but that emphasis does not really simplify matters. In fact, I think your argument may have further confused them.
You suggest that the current situation is deplorable ‘ab initio’ precisely in that it is unfair to the child — “the child will pay”. Alternately, the gay couple might not have contracted the surrogate mother in the first place, in which case this child simply would not have been born. The child wouldn’t pay. She wouldn’t anything. I can’t imagine how that would be better for her.
(Put another way, in order for there to be a question of the child’s rights or welfare, there has to be a child. By which point, that child’s ‘unorthodox’ conception is past. Whether or not that conception was in the child’s best welfare is necessarily imponderable.)
There is, of course, another alternative. The dispute began when the surrogate mother reneged on her apparent agreement to defer custody to the two fathers. Prior to that point the child would have had one home and one set of parents. It’s the exercise of her parental rights specifically that created the present dispute and the subsequent joint custody agreement. Perhaps it’s her selfishness, particularly, that should be deplore…?
Personally, I understand her desire to share custody and I would be skeptical of any contract or ruling that barred her, absolutely, from doing so. Parental rights and a child’s welfare are indissoluble, past a certain point. After all, the assignment of custody determines who exactly may decide the child’s best welfare, beyond certain basic standards. I imagine most parents dispute custody in large part because they feel that they can contribute integrally to that welfare.
Tim:
Your argument reduces fatherhood to a question biological parentage. As adoptive, foster or step-parents demonstrate, fatherhood has as much or more to do with raising a child as genetic heritage. (I don’t imagine that this basic point has escaped you. Yet, I see no cognizance of it in your argument.) Custody cases often recognize the role parents have had in, well, actually parenting. I suspect this may be the rationale for placing a time limitation on certain custody disputes in Minnesota.
Additionally, having a fixed custody clearly serves a child’s best interest. It would be highly problematic if the child’s custody could come seriously into question at any time. Legal claims of custody, like the birth certificate and subsequent court rulings, need to be enforceable.
December 7, 2009, 1:01 pmRandy says:
Theo: “t’s also dysfunctional because of the unorthodox manner in which that child was brought into this world. When three people decide to be parents but they don’t actually want to be parents together, there’s going to be problems — and the child will pay.”
Then you are against all surrogate parenting. Fine — as long as you are against it for both gay and straight couples.
But the issue here was that the three were all in agreement at the time of the surrogate The gay couple would be the parents. The trouble started when the straight person, the birth mother, decided that she wanted to be a parent too. So if you are going to claim selfishness on the part of anyone, it is the birth mother who changed her mind.
“What I find to be eternally galling about these issues is the incessant focus on parental rights, as if the child is like a house in an alimony suit.”
Agreed. Therefore your ire should be directed at the birth mother who changed her mind and brought the ‘bloody’ lawsuit in the first place to assert her parental rights.
December 7, 2009, 3:06 pmRandy says:
Theo on Palin: “I’m downright enraged that people are considering it child endangerment or some sort of recklessness to dare to get on a plane during the latter half of the last trimester. Pregnant women are still human beings who are entitled to travel about this country.”
It is when you are informed that you about to birth a child with special needs. It’s rather strange that you complain about parents and admonish them “It’s not all about you!” But then when it comes to Palin, gosh, why should any parent be inconvenienced by a potential difficult birth when you’ve got some campaigning to do?
Others might conclude that your rage is directed more towards gays and people you dislike than any real consideration for children. But me, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.
December 7, 2009, 3:14 pmreadery says:
Because some states don’t wish to give surrogacy contracts the same status as other contracts.
The Supreme Court in Dred Scott v. Sanford held that making such a distinction between these two types of contracts is not fair. Some religious fundamentalists who kept putting their noses into other peoole’s lifestyles managed to get a constitutional amendment past which some people think means that such distinctions continue to matter.
December 7, 2009, 8:26 pmRicardo says:
Readery, way to elevate the discussion. The point here is that if a parent signs away his or her parental rights either before or around the time a child is born, I think that decision should be binding. Otherwise, you run into cases where birth parents seek out children they put up for adoption years later and try to reclaim custody. Or men who abandoned their single-mother girlfriends years later try to demand joint custody.
December 7, 2009, 10:32 pm