I recently read about a couple who had a civil union in VT. They’d previously lived in VA. After being together for several years, they decided to have a baby. One of them became pregnant via artificial insemination and gave birth to a daughter. Then, a little over a year later, the couple splits and the mother (Miller) moves to VA. She seeks to have the civil union dissolved and the partner (Jenkins) agrees. In court, the birth mother acknowledges that the other is considered a parent to the child.
Perfectly normal situation. People marry, have kids, divorce, argue over the kids, etc. It happens a lot.
Should it matter that the couple in this case are both women? Their VT civil union makes them as legal a couple as one with mixed-gender couples. The non-birth mother has the same rights as a non-birth father in the case of artificial insemination.
Except this case has exploded and dragged on for years. Miller has continually denied Jenkins visitation rights despite the court orders. On and on it has gone until finally, fed up, the VT judge grants Jenkins custody based on Miller’s continual contempt of court. Now Miller, who is an “ex-gay” and an Evangelical Christian, has disappeared with the kid.
The Virginia appeals court and state supreme court have all said that their Vermont civil union, at least in terms of the child custody, should be honored. Virginia has a law that specifically does not recognize same gender marriages/civil unions from other states. However, due to other federal laws designed to keep a parent from abducting children, they cannot ignore that Jenkins has legal rights as the other parent. The federal supreme court refused to hear the case.
Vermont law says that Jenkins has the same rights as the non-biological father in artificial insemination. The judge, the same judge has been with the case since it first started, is known as a conservative but a strict follower of the law. He granted Miller custody in the beginning but stipulated that, like any divorce and custody case, Jenkins is to be allowed visitation. Jenkins’ parents live close to where Miller lives. She traveled to VA every weekend for a long time although most times Miller wouldn’t let her see the kid or wouldn’t allow unsupervised visits. Miller even got VA Social Services involved saying the kid was acting wrong after any unsupervised visits. The case workers could find nothing wrong. Imagine that.
There’s a lot on the ‘net about this case. There’s rumors that when Miller’s attorneys next meet with the VT judge he will slap them with contempt of court charges. They’ve not made any statement about the location of Miller. I’ve been keeping up with it, hoping that Miller shows up and honors the court order. Today, I see an article titled “Custody Case Highlights Artificiality of Same Sex Marriage“. I should have known better than to click it but, alas, I did.
The article continually bounces back and forth, presenting facts one minute and propaganda the next. I prefer articles about facts with some emotional aspects and opinions thrown in to keep me interested. Another article, “Who’s Your Daddy? Or Your Other Daddy? Or Your Mommy?” deals with parental rights and mentions three twisted cases.
In comes down to this, in my opinion: We cannot ask for the cake and then ignore the calories. There, I said it.
We ask for equal rights (it’s on our agenda, ya know) and that includes the right to marry. And with the right to marry comes the right to divorce. And the right to have a nasty divorce. And to argue over who really owns that fugly lamp that cost far too much money. Yet, divorce is not something we discuss. For millennia, a marriage certificate was the signature on the UHaul rental contract and divorce meant we got boxes and moved out. Not any more. Boxes won’t do it. We demanded the right for equal rights in marriage now we need to demand the right for equal rights in divorce.
