Shortly after AB 205‚ the California Domestic Partner Rights and Responsibilities Act of 2003‚ was signed into law, two right-wing groups filed lawsuits seeking to prevent the law from going into effect.

NCLR, the ACLU, and Equality Florida challenged a proposed anti-marriage equality voter initiative in the Florida Supreme Court. The measure, if passed, would block recognition of marriage and jeopardize the current domestic partner protections.

The anti-gay group Campaign for California Families (CCF) submitted a proposed initiative to amend the California Constitution to permanently exclude same-sex couples from the right to marry and to eliminate the rights and responsibilities provided to registered domestic partners.

NCLR assisted S., a transgender father in Chicago. S. has lived his entire adult life as a male and has undergone medical treatment for sex-reassignment. He also had his birth certificate changed to reflect his male gender. S. married in 1985. He and his wife had a child together in 1992 through alternative insemination. When S. filed for divorce in 1998, his wife counter-petitioned to have their marriage declared void and to terminate S.’s parental rights.

Birgit Koebke and Kendall French, a lesbian couple who have been domestic partners for 12 years, sued the Bernardo Heights Country Club for refusing to provide them with the same membership benefits given to different-sex couples and for allowing other members to harass and insult them because of their sexual orientation.

In June 2005, love, patience, and persistence, combined with a visionary judge and a little help from Dr. Phil, led to an historic settlement agreement between NCLR client Michael Kantaras and his former wife. Michael, a transsexual father, has been fighting for almost seven years to retain his parental rights to his two children, aged 16 and 13.