(Nashville, TN, January 30, 2012)—On January 25, 2012, Chancellor Carol L. McCoy of the Davidson County Chancery Court in Nashville issued a preliminary order in Howe v. Haslam. Howe is the highly publicized case challenging the Tennessee Legislature’s enactment of HB 600, which overturned a Metro non-discrimination ordinance by prohibiting municipalities and counties, including local school districts, from enacting local laws or school policies that protect lesbian, gay, bisexual, and...
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State legislation
Statement by NCLR Executive Director Kate Kendell, Esq. (San Francisco, CA, December 8, 2011)—Today, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral argument about whether the courts should publicly release the video of the historic trial to overturn Proposition 8, the measure that stripped same-sex couples of the right to marry in California. The court also heard oral argument on Prop 8 supporters’ outrageous request to throw out the court decision striking down the initiative. Since suffering...
Statement by NCLR Executive Director Kate Kendell, Esq. (San Francisco, November 17, 2011)—Today, the California Supreme Court issued a decision holding that California law empowers the sponsors of Proposition 8 to appeal the federal district court’s decision in Perry v. Brown finding Prop 8 unconstitutional, even though the state’s Attorney General and Governor both agree that the district court decision striking down Prop 8 should not be appealed. Perry v. Brown is the federal challenge to...
(San Francisco, CA, November 8, 2011)—Today, a coalition of groups advocating for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender equality filed a friend-of-the-court brief urging the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold a U.S. District Court decision that rejected a move to vacate the historic August 2010 ruling that invalidated Proposition 8, the 2008 ballot measure that stripped the freedom to marry from same-sex couples in California. The National Center for Lesbian Rights, Lambda Legal,...
Statement by NCLR Federal Executive Director Kate Kendell, Esq. (San Francisco, CA, October 11, 2011)—On October 9, 2011, California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law a bill—AB 641—that provides same-sex spouses and registered domestic partners of nursing home residents the same financial protections available to opposite sex married couples. The groundbreaking law protects Californians in same sex relationships from losing access to joint financial resources, such as bank accounts or stock,...
(San Francisco, CA, September 30, 2011)—A settlement was announced today in the case of Vanessa Adams, a Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) inmate at FMC Butner in North Carolina, who has gender identity disorder (GID). Adams sued BOP in order to receive appropriate treatment for her GID. Adam’s challenge to BOP’s treatment of transgender prisoners has resulted in BOP ending its so-called “freeze frame” policy in which treatment for any person with GID is kept frozen at the level provided at the...
Statement by NCLR Legal Director Shannon Minter, Esq. (San Francisco, CA, September 19, 2011)—Today, U.S. District Court Chief Judge James Ware ordered the public release of the video recording of the historic trial in Perry v. Brown. In that trial, which took place in January 2010, two same-sex couples challenged Proposition 8, the 2008 ballot measure that stripped the freedom to marry from same-sex couples in California. Following the trial, now-retired Chief District Judge Vaughn Walker...
Statement by NCLR Executive Director Kate Kendell, Esq. (San Francisco, CA, September 13, 2011)—Today, the North Carolina Senate voted 30-16 to put a sweeping constitutional amendment before voters that would not only bar same-sex couples from marriage, but also deprive them of any type of legal recognition. On Monday, the bill, SB 514, cleared the House Rules Committee before it immediately moved to the full House, where legislators voted 75-42 to move it forward. The measure will go before...
Assembly Bill 641 Extends Financial Protections for Medi-Cal’s Long Term Care Benefit to Same Sex Spouses and Registered Domestic Partners (Sacramento, CA, September 9, 2011)—The Legislature has given final approval to legislation authored by Assembly Member Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles) that would provide same sex spouses and registered domestic partners of nursing home residents the same financial protections available to opposite sex married couples. Without these protections, Californians in...
On April 15, 2010, President Barack Obama issued a memo directing the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to adopt new regulations that would require nearly all hospitals to grant equal visitation rights to all families, not just those based on marriage or biological ties. In the memo, President Obama specifically talked about same-sex couples as an example of families that have been unfairly kept apart when one partner is hospitalized. Open pdf