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Yahoo
18-04-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Same-sex parenting rights under scrutiny in Ohio Supreme Court case set for oral argument this month
The Gavel outside the Supreme Court of the State of Ohio. (Photo by Graham Stokes for Ohio Capital Journal. Republish photo only with original article.) A case regarding parental rights in a same-sex relationship will be heard by the Ohio Supreme Court this month. It could test not only Ohio law but the federal Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage. The state's highest court will hold oral arguments in a case appealed from the First District Court of Appeals to decide the parental rights of a woman who was in a relationship with the children's mother when the child was born. But the woman was never married to the mother, and does not have adoptive rights to the children. Priya Shahani and Carmen Edmonds were in a relationship for more than a decade, and had thoughts of getting married. But the bulk of their relationship occurred before the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision Obergefell v. Hodges, an Ohio-based case that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide. Edmonds argues the couple travelled to Boston with plans to get married, but decided against it, due to the fact that Ohio would not recognize the marriage at that time. The state also does not recognize common-law marriages. During the course of the relationship, Shahani had three children using a sperm donor that court documents say was chosen because he matched Edmonds' nationality. Shahani and Edmonds sought to legally dissolve their relationship after 11 years, an agreement that included scheduled parenting time for Edmonds, but the children still held hyphenated names. It wasn't until after Shahani removed the hyphenate from the children's names and filed to terminate their shared-custody agreement that the case started. Edmonds argued that the couple's 'marriage-like relationship' gave her rights to the children. A lower court awarded Edmonds 'companionship time,' but otherwise effectively ruled against both women. It refused to terminate the shared custody agreement while also not allowing a 'parentage' decree for Edmonds. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX When both went to the First District Court of Appeals for answers, Edmonds brought up the Obergefell case legalizing same-sex marriage. Edmonds argued that under that decision, parental rights statutes apply in this case as they would for married couples. The appellate court said the trial court needed to hold a hearing to decide whether the couple would have been married if the same-sex marriage decision had been in place. Ohio law only recognizes parents if they are married, have a biological connection, or have legally adopted the child, something that requires marriage in the case of the 'second parent.' The ACLU of Ohio said state parentage laws, combined with the Obergefell decision, 'provide a pathway for Ms. Edmonds and other non-biological, non-adoptive, same-sex parents who were unable to have their marriages legally recognized in the state of Ohio during the course of their relationship to establish legal parentage and confer the accompanying rights and responsibilities of parenthood.' Shahani, noted that she made 'the major child-related decisions' including expenses and medical needs. She told the supreme court that giving Edmonds parental rights goes against both state law and the Obergefell decision, even if state statutes were looked at with gender-neutral language. 'This case is about whether Ohio's courts can reinvent history as a mechanism for seizing a fit parent's constitutionally protected rights,' attorneys for Shahani wrote in an October brief to the court. In a state where common-law marriage isn't recognized, the attorneys said the state constitution, as well as the U.S. Constitution, doesn't allow state courts to 'manufacture an unlicensed marriage into existence.' 'The foundation upon which a 'would have been married' standard rests is a hypothetical injury that the individual may have been denied a marriage license if they had applied for one, or the state may not have recognized a marriage had there been an out-of-state marriage,' attorneys told the state supreme court. Shahani refutes Edmonds' claim that the two travelled to Boston to get married, then changed their minds. But even if that were true, the legal result should be no different, she argues. 'Even in Ms. Edmonds's version of events, she would not have been married to Ms. Shahani when the insemination occurred, and therefore would not have parental rights,' court documents stated, citing a state statute regarding artificial insemination of a married woman. The law, effective as of March 2001, specifies a woman 'and her husband' must sign a written consent to the insemination for the 'non-spousal artificial insemination' to occur. The case was mentioned as one of the 'state oral arguments to watch' this month by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU. The center identifies 'prominent or interesting state court cases,' which this month include the Ohio parental rights case, along with a challenge to Wyoming's abortion ban, an appeal to New York City's greenhouse gas emissions caps, the process of electing appellate judges in Arizona and voter power over zoning changes in an area of Georgia where descendants of slaves have historically taken up residence. Oral arguments in the case will be heard on April 22 by the Ohio Supreme Court. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Ohio AG's office lays out argument in appeal that avoids fighting the six-week abortion ban
Photo by Getty Images. The Ohio Attorney General's Office does not plan to fight a court ruling overturning the six-week abortion ban, but he wants an appellate court to roll back rulings that overturned other parts of the same law. In a brief submitted to the First District Court of Appeals, Ohio's solicitor general, T. Elliot Gaiser, reiterated that the appeal before the court didn't have anything to do with attempting to roll back a Hamilton County judge's ruling that a ban on abortions at six weeks gestation, included in 2019's Senate Bill 23, was unconstitutional. 'The state has long conceded the obvious: The state's 'Heartbeat Ban' – which banned abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected – was overridden by the new Abortion Amendment,' Gaiser wrote, referring to the 2023 constitutional amendment passed by 57% of Ohio voters to enshrine reproductive rights including abortion into the state document. 'Thus, the state is not defending that Heartbeat Ban. Nor is the state even trying, in this appeal, to defend the merits of any of the ancillary abortion regulations that were amended or enacted in the same bill as the Heartbeat Ban.' Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas Judge Christian Jenkins cited the constitutional amendment as part of his October 2024 ruling, saying the Ohio Constitution now protects 'the right to pre-viability abortion,' and to 'give meaning to the voice of Ohio's voters, the Amendment must be given full effect, and laws such as those enacted by (Senate Bill) 23 must be enjoined.' The state is appealing decisions it says came alongside the six-week abortion ban ruling, that were made by the judge without a request from the groups suing to see the abortion ban struck down. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX The solicitor general claimed the trial court decision 'broke all the rules,' and the plaintiffs in the case 'filed a vague, unclear motion for judgment.' Gaiser said the trial court should have asked whether the provisions of the law could 'stand alone' without the six-week abortion ban attached to them. 'Many provisions here plainly can, as they were law for years before S.B. 23 was enacted,' the brief stated. Those provisions included what Gaiser called a 'Check and Tell' provision, a requirement that doctors check for fetal cardiac activity and offer to allow the pregnant individual to hear it. The main reason supporters called the law the 'Heartbeat Act' was because they claimed a fetal heartbeat was present at six weeks of pregnancy. Scientist say fetal cardiac activity at that stage isn't a fully formed heart, but instead indicates cardiac tissue development. Some of the provisions brought up in the brief have been temporarily paused by a different court case, one in Franklin County in August 2024. In that case, a judge in the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas pumped the brakes on a 24-hour waiting period required before an abortion and the provision requiring doctors to check fetal activity. Judge David C. Young cited the constitutional amendment as reason to stop enforcement of the requirements in that case for now. Gaiser said the Hamilton County court that took up the S.B. 23 case 'relied on the analysis' from the Franklin County case in issuing its decision, even though 'plaintiffs did not even identify the challenged statutes' in the initial lawsuit 'and did not offer any substantive challenge to them.' Provisions such as definition sections, Ohio Department of Health reporting requirements, and others 'can all work on their own without a Heartbeat Ban,' according to the brief. 'True, some (of the other provisions) might not seem to achieve much – such as the express protection of contraception – but they also do not harm Plaintiffs by staying in place, and even if they merely state the General Assembly's intent as to contraception and the like, that is no small thing,' Gaiser wrote. 'One critical representative function of any legislature is to codify the moral judgments of the community, including moral approval – here, of contraceptives.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
