FRACTALISED FRAGMENTED THERAPEUTIC BLOGGING: Will New York finally get it right for children of lesbian couples?

Thursday 3 September 2009

Will New York finally get it right for children of lesbian couples?

The following has been clipped from The Bilerico Project Report, dated 02 September 2009

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It's almost 20 years since the highest court in New York ruled that a child planned for by a lesbian couple, born to one partner using donor insemination, and raised as the child of two mothers, nonetheless has only one legal parent; and that legal parent has complete autonomy to decide whether the child maintains a relationship with the nonbio mom once the couple splits up. No exceptions.

This isn't Texas. Or Missouri. Or another state known for hostility to same-sex couples raising children. (Texas won't allow the names of two same-sex adoptive parents to appear on the birth certificate of a child born in Texas but adopted elsewhere; Missouri has more reported opinions denying custody to a gay or lesbian parent in favor of a straight ex-spouse than any other state in the country).

No, this is New York. But the case of Alison D. v. Virginia M. was decided by the New York Court of Appeals (the state's highest court) in 1991 and it established an iron-clad rule that a nonbiological parent has no standing to bring an action for custody or visitation rights. So unless the couple went to a lawyer and spent the money and time on a second-parent adoption, the child risks the loss of a parent, including the loss of financial support, if the couple splits up.

Well, that may change.