Family Law: Marriage Equality, Civil Unions, Unmarried Partners

This book " ... is the second of two books expanding on PINNACLE's earlier publication, Sexual Orientation and the Law, which was released shortly before the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed all individuals' right to marry whomever they choose in Obergefell v. Hodges, 135 S. Ct. 2584 (2015). This second book takes an expanded look at how this changed legal landscape affects all unmarried couples in the areas of estate planning, family formation, relationship termination, adoption and surrogacy, and domestic partnership status and availability. Additionally, we continue our development of these topics with an eye toward a large group of Americans-the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer/questioning community-whose specific interests and needs might not be clearly addressed in existing texts"--Page iii

"As a legal scholar who first argued in the early 1990s for a right to gay marriage, William N. Eskridge Jr. has been on the front lines of the debate over same-sex marriage for decades. In this book, Eskridge and his coauthor, Christopher R. Riano, offer a panoramic and definitive history of America's marriage equality debate. The authors explore the deeply religious, rabidly political, frequently administrative, and pervasively constitutional features of the debate and consider all angles of its dramatic history. While giving a full account of the legal and political issues, the authors never lose sight of the personal stories of the people involved, or of the central place the right to marry holds in a person's ability to enjoy the dignity of full citizenship. This is not a triumphalist or one-sided book but a thoughtful history of how the nation wrestled with an important question of moral and legal equality." -- Amazon.com

xiii, 214 pages ; 24 cm
Bibliog. Includes bibliographical references and index
Summary: "Today, about one-half of all adults are unmarried. Many of them are in other kinds of significant relationships, yet the law offers them few protections. Although a few states have created nonmarital relationship statuses, they fall far short of the kind of comprehensive structures needed to recognize and protect. John Culhane offers a comprehensive approach to satisfying the needs of this vast population of unmarried adults. Using a narrative approach that resulted from in-depth interviews, he gives voice to the many couples inadequately served by existing law. Their stories provide living evidence of the need for the law to extend its reach to those who are inadequately protected-or not protected at all"-- Provided by publisher
Contents: Introduction : marriage equality - an important but limited victory -- The dawn of the domestic partnership, or "we bored them to death" -- Civil unions : not marriage, but an incredible simulation! -- The Designated Beneficiary Agreement Act : Colorado's successful experiment -- What is marriage, anyway? (and what isn't marriage?) -- Matching relationship law to reality

Description: 2 volumes ; 25 cm
Includes bibliographical references and index
Contents: vol. 1. Raising children and the new family law -- Same-sex marriage, civil unions and other protections for couples -- Cohabitation and property ownership agreements -- Federal taxes -- Death and incapacity -- Employment -- State initiatives -- Military and veterans -- Immigration -- Legal protections for transgender and gender nonconforming people -- vol. 2. Consumer goods, services and accommodations -- First and Fourteenth Amendment rights -- Juveniles -- Criminal defense -- Criminal

viii, 258 pages ; 23 cm
Series: Families, Law, and Society
Includes bibliographical references and index
Summary: "This interdisciplinary book compares legal responses to social parenthood, exploring how legal systems recognize adults-including same-sex partners, stepparents, nonmarital partners, grandparents, fictive kin, and other caretakers-who are parenting children, but who are not typically treated as legal parents"-- Provided by publisher
Contents: Introduction / Clare Huntington, Courtney G. Joslin, and Christiane von Bary -- A psychological perspective on the significance of legal recognition of diverse social parent relationships for children / Abbie E. Goldberg -- Same-sex parents : a case study from Italy / Corinna Sabrina Guerzoni -- Stepparents : a social science perspective / Marie-Christine Saint-Jacques and Marion Adamiste -- Nonparental primary caregivers : a case study from the United States / Kristina Brant -- Social parenthood in Canada / Claire Houston -- Social parenthood in Mexico / Sofía Treviño Fernández -- Social parenthood in the United States / Courtney G. Joslin and Douglas NeJaime -- Social parenthood in England and Wales / Jens M. Scherpe -- Social parenthood in Germany / Christiane von Bary -- Social parenthood in Greece / Eleni Zervogianni -- Social parenthood in the Netherlands / Machteld Vonk and Wendy Schrama -- Social parenthood in Russia / Olga Khazova -- Social parenthood in Sweden / Eva Ryrstedt -- The future of social parenthood / Clare Huntington, Courtney G. Joslin, and Christiane von Bary