Arizona Supreme Court Says Arizona must add option for same-sex parents to birth certificate forms

May 17, 2021 at 02:31AM

Same-sex spouses have the same parental rights as opposite-sex spouses under Arizona law, the Arizona Supreme Court has ruled.

In a decision in which all seven justices at least partially agreed, the court said the U.S. Supreme Court ruling legalizing marriage for same-sex couples requires the state to grant same-sex married couples all of the rights as opposite-sex married couples — including in custody sharing and financial child support.

"It would be inconsistent with Obergefell (the U.S. Supreme Court ruling) to conclude that same-sex couples can legally marry but states can then deny them the same benefits of marriage afforded opposite-sex couples," the judges said in their opinion. "Legal parent status is, undoubtedly, a benefit of marriage."

The case is part of ongoing efforts to reinterpret Arizona laws following U.S. Supreme Court rulings granting same-sex couples the right to marry.

It focused on parental rights and whether the state's so-called "paternity" statute is about a marriage certificate or biology.

The Arizona statute addressing parental rights states that "a man is presumed to be the father of a child" if he and the mother were married within 10 months of a child's birth — a period of time covering the gestational period.

Case details

In this case, Kimberly and Suzan McLaughlin married in California in 2008 and later moved to Arizona. Arizona recognized the marriage as retroactively legal following the Obergefell ruling.

The couple decided to have a baby via artificial insemination using an anonymous sperm donor. Kimberly got pregnant and they had a son in 2011. Kimberly worked outside the home as a physician while Suzan stayed home and cared for the boy, according to court records.

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