Aug 26, 2005   | COMMENTS     

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Same-sex couples who raise children are lawful parents and must provide for them if they break up, the California Supreme Court ruled Monday. The precedent-setting decision puts former gay and lesbian couples on equal ground with unmarried heterosexual couples who break up and marks the latest decision by the court recognizing rights of same-sex couples. The justices, ruling in three cases, said for the first time that custody and child support laws that hold absent fathers accountable and protect children from the stigma of illegitimacy also apply to estranged gay couples who used reproductive science to conceive. In doing so, one woman was granted the right to be the second mother of twins after the birth mother moved out of state. The court also ruled that a lesbian cannot avoid paying child support for her former partner’s biological children, and that another woman could not go to court to terminate the parental rights of her former lover, years after obtaining a court order stipulating they were both parents. Courtney Joslin, an attorney with the National Center for Lesbian Rights, said, “This is the first time any state supreme court in the country has made this ruling.”

Christian group disrupts Gay Day at Phillies game
PHILADELPHIA — As the Phillies battled the Washington Nationals last week, participants in the ball park’s Gay Day faced members of a fundamentalist Christian group, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. Repent America protested Gay Day, in which many fans attended the game as part of a Gay Pride group. The national anthem at the game was performed by the Philadelphia Gay Men’s Chorus. For the third year, Repent America’s Michael Marcavage attended the game in protest of Gay Day, and he and another man held a sign that read, “Homosexuality Is a Sin, Christ Can Save You” at the top of Section 303 in right field, the newspaper reported. “This is totally offensive to me,” James Duggan, a fan who argued with Marcavage, told the Inquirer. “These people are false Christians.”

Fla. activists near goal on gay marriage ban
TALLAHASSEE — Organizers have collected nearly enough signatures to put a gay marriage ban proposal on the November 2006 ballot, the St. Petersburg Times reported. The measure would amend the Florida constitution to ban gay unions, and leaders of the effort said they expect within days to have enough signatures to prompt a review by the Florida Supreme Court. The “Florida Marriage Protection Amendment” would amend the state constitution to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman, specifying that no other kind of marriage or legal union is equivalent to marriage. Organizers must have 611,009 signatures by Feb. 1 to put the proposal on the ballot, the Times reported. It defines marriage and also bans other legal unions, and there is a constitutional requirement limiting citizen petitions to only one subject, said Nadine Smith, executive director of Equality Florida.

Mass. to vote on anti-marriage amendment again on Sept. 14
BOSTON (AP) — Massachusetts state legislators voted Wednesday to meet next month for a Constitutional Convention aimed at debating for the second time a proposed amendment replacing gay marriage in Massachusetts with Vermont-style civil unions. Members of the House and Senate have already given initial approval to the amendment, but the state constitution requires them to approve identical language in two successive sessions before the amendment can be put before state voters. That would occur in 2006. Legislative approval has been thrown into doubt after some supporters in the initial vote announced they had changed their mind. The most recent is Rep. Anthony Petruccelli (D-Boston), who was quoted this week as saying he will not vote for the proposal despite supporting it last year. Petruccelli told Bay Windows, a gay Boston paper, that legalized gay marriage has “made strong unions among people who have not had the opportunity until that time to get married.” The Supreme Judicial Court ordered the state in 2003 to begin marrying gay couples, effective May 17, 2004. Since then, thousands of same-sex couples have wed in the only state to sanctions such marriages.

Ore. State Bar continues ban on National Guard advertising
KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. (AP) — The board of directors of the Oregon State Bar has voted to continue its ban on Oregon national guard advertising in its bulletin because of the military stance on gays. In an 11-3 vote last week, the board rejected a recommendation from an advisory committee that would have allowed the Oregon State Bar Bulletin to resume accepting recruitment ads. The committee had urged the board to exempt the military from the bulletin’s policy of prohibiting ads for employers that discriminate in hiring.

From staff and wire reports