The Law Center's Litigation Program brings public impact cases throughout the Northwest, participates as amicus curiae in cases affecting women throughout the nation, and provides technical assistance in litigation, legislation and advocacy to organizations and attorneys in Montana, Oregon, Idaho, Washington, and Alaska.

Some of our most important accomplishments in Litigation:

	Girls and Young Women
	Civil Rights for Women
	Women's Equality in Employment
	Women's Rights in Family Law
	Women's Health
	Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered People
	Reproductive Freedom
	Violence Against Women

• Enforcing state and federal law against athletic discrimination in educational programs. (Blair v. Washington State University; Paul v. Methow Valley School District; Fast Pitch Softball Cases Throughout the Northwest).
• Requiring local sports programs to provide equal opportunities for girl athletes. (Eve Russell v. Seattle Youth Soccer Association; Firebirds Hockey Association v. City of Anchorage et al)
• Protecting young women from peer-to-peer sexual harassment in schools. (Doe v. Everett School District)
• Successfully representing a middle school student expelled from school solely because she was pregnant. (In re S.S.)
• Ensuring that statutes of limitations that allow a longer time period for filing civil claims of childhood sexual abuse apply in claims against churches for failure to protect children from sexual abuse. (CJC v. Corp. of the Catholic Bishop of Yakima et al.)
• Requiring Washington State to provide equal educational opportunities for youth in correctional facilities. (Tunstall ex rel. v. Bergeson)
• Arguing on behalf of child sexual assault victims' privacy rights. (Koenig v. City of Des Moines)
• Successfully representing a teenage girl whose mother sued the state foster care system for "allowing her daughter to become a lesbian." (Kidd v. DSHS)

• Ensuring enforcement of state and federal laws against athletic discrimination in educational programs. (Blair v. Washington State University; Paul v. Methow Valley School District; In the Matter of Seattle School District Girls Softball)
• Forcing the state of Alaska to create a women-only correctional facility and provide services and programs equivalent to those provided to men. (Cleary v. Smith)
• Requiring the Fraternal Order of Eagles to admit women as members in Washington State. (Grand Aerie, Fraternal Order of Eagles v. Fraternal Order of Eagles, Tenino Aerie No. 564)
• Preventing discrimination against older women in public benefits. (Purser v. Rahm, State of Washington v. Bowen)
• Litigating on behalf of welfare recipients against Washington's residency requirements. (Ruffin v. Quasim)

• Successfully urging the Washington State Supreme Court to confirm that pregnancy discrimination is sex discrimination. (Hegwine v. Longview Fibre)
• Protecting the right to parental leave in Oregon. (Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries v. Portland Gas & Electric)
• Successfully urging the Washington State Supreme Court to recognize a common-law cause of action for gender discrimination in wrongful termination cases. (Roberts v. Dudley)
• Successfully suing to prevent discrimination against women in non-traditional jobs, such as firefighting. (In re Tanya Pierce)
• Protecting the rights of pregnant women to maintain their employment benefits on an equal basis with male colleagues. (Association of Female Firefighters v. Seattle Fire Department Relief Association; Roe v. Doe)
• Ensuring that women who are sexually harassed on the job are entitled to unemployment compensation when forced to leave their employment. (Hussa v. Employment Security Dept.)

• Successfully arguing for the recognition of non-traditional families (In re Adoption of a child; Parentage of L.B)
• Urging the courts to recognize non-traditional families. (In re Adoption of a Child; Parentage of L.B.; Hall v. Damron)
• Ensuring that post-retirement benefits awarded in divorce are protected for the homemaker spouse regardless of whether the ex-spouse becomes disabled prior to retirement. (In re Marriage of Knies)
• Working to ensure that primary residential parents may move with their children when necessary. (Stoneman v. Drollinger; Horner v. Horner; Wade v. Wade)
• Successfully arguing that same-sex couples should be accorded the same property division rules as other unmarried couples in marriage-like relationships. (Vasquez v. Hawthorne; Gormley v. Robertson)
• Successfully arguing for the constitutionality of Washington state's child support laws. (Marriage of Giovannone and Baze; P.O.P.S. v. Gardner)

• Intervening to protect patients' rights to their prescriptions. (Stormans et al v. Selecky)
• Fighting insurance discrimination against women with breast and ovarian cancer, who are the most frequent victims of the common insurance practice of denying coverage for life-saving treatments deemed "experimental". (Winters v. Costco; Bast v. Prudential)
• Litigating to protect the rights of women to seek confidential mental health care without harassment and invasion of privacy. (Calof v. Noah et al)
• Challenging a private employer's discrimination against women by its failure to provide contraceptive coverage in its employee health plan policy. (Erickson v. Bartell)
• Working to ensure that hospital mergers between secular and religious institutions do not result in reduction of the full range of health care services for women.

• Filing suit on behalf of same-sex couples who wish to marry in Washington State. (Andersen et al. v. Sims et al.)
• Successfully challenging the U.S. military's ban on gay and lesbian service members that led to the discharge of Colonel Grethe Cammermeyer, who was reinstated as a result of the lawsuit. (Cammermeyer v. Perry)
• Defeating Montana's "Deviate Sexual Conduct Law", which criminalized intimate sexual conduct between consenting adults of the same sex. (Gryczan v. Montana)
• Urging the courts to recognize non-traditional families. (In re Adoption of a Child; Parentage of L.B.; Hall v. Damron; Snetsinger v. Montana Unversity System)
• Successfully arguing that same-sex couples should be accorded the same property division rules as other unmarried couples in marriage-like relationships. (Vasquez v. Hawthorne; Gormley v. Robertson)
• Protecting the legal rights of a teenage girl whose mother sued the state foster care system for "allowing her daughter to become a lesbian." (Kidd v. DSHS)

• Suing the United States Department of Defense's insurer for failure to cover service members and their dependents' medically necessary abortions. (Doe v. United States)
• Protecting women's access to reproductive health clinics. (Aradia Women's Health Center et al. v. Operation Rescue; Bering v. Share)
• Fighting encroachment on women's fundamental rights to protect their health and reproductive freedom. (In re the Guardianship of JMB)
• Opposing medical procedures forced on pregnant women. (Dinino v. State)
• Arguing for the rights of women, especially women with disabilities, to be free from forced sterilization or contraception. (Morinaga v. Vue)
• Successfully resisting prosecution of pregnant women who use controlled substances, which public health experts agree is counter-productive and unwise. (State v. Dunn)

• Ensuring that law enforcement agencies protect victims of domestic violence. (City of Tacoma v. State of Washington; Roy v. Everett)
• Successfully representing a battered immigrant woman before the Ninth Circuit, which held, in a case of first impression, that the term "extreme cruelty" under the Violence Against Women Act must include the non-physical acts of violence that are part of a pattern of domestic abuse. (Hernandez v. Ashcroft)
• Urging recognition of the tort of domestic violence. (Ziegler v. Ziegler; Tamloss v. Tamloss)
• Successfully litigating on behalf of victims of domestic violence who need to relocate with their children. (Stoneman v. Drollinger; Wade v. Wade)
• Successfully arguing that Montana's statute of limitations that allows a longer time for filing civil claims for childhood sexual abuse includes negligence claims. (Werre v. David)
• Leading the legal efforts to ensure that courts recognize the experience of battered women in criminal prosecutions resulting from self-defense against domestic abusers. (State v. Allery; Painter v. State; State v. Ciskie)
• Ensuring that sexual assault victims may maintain their personal privacy through rape shield laws. (State v. Gonzalez; State v. Hudlow)
• Successfully defending the constitutionality of a Washington law that retroactively allows adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse to bring a civil action against the abuser within three years of recalling the abuse. (Keene v. Edie)