Celebrating Diverse Families

What makes a family?
Who decides who qualifies as a family?
What protections should a family have?

These questions and many more inform the Law Center's Celebrating Diverse Families initiative. Several years ago we realized that the areas of family law, lesbian and gay rights, assisted reproductive technology and reproductive freedom were linked by the core question of who gets treated as a family. And we realized that the law was hopelessly outdated as far as who is recognized as a 'family'. So we set out to reform state laws - one by one if necessary - to ensure that all families, whether different-sex or same-sex, inter-generational, single-parent, or child-free, are recognized and protected by the law. Our work includes:

	Establishing that non-biological lesbian parents and others who have parented a child can be legally recognized and have the right to retain their relationship with their child (In Re L.B.) Link to decision >>
	Ensuring that frozen "pre-embryos" are not treated as children, and that decision-making about them does not depend on genetic connection (Litowitz v. Litowitz)
	Obtaining the right for lesbian and gay couples to have their property divided equitably when their relationship ends, just as different-sex unmarried couples do (Gormley v. Robertson)
	Fighting for the rights of all couples to marry, without regard to sexual orientation (Andersen v. King County) Link to marriage equality page >>
	Forcing the University of Montana to provide domestic partner benefits to same-sex couples as well as to unmarried different-sex couples (Snetsinger v. University of Montana)
	Educating grandparents and other kinship caregivers about their rights and how the legal system can help them. Link to Self Help page >>

We'll continue looking for cases and advocating for legislation to ensure that the rights of all families are recognized and protected under the law.

	Self Help Tools
	Marriage Equality
	Carvin decision