Her request said “this Court’s review of the Alabama Supreme Court’s decision is urgently needed” because “the Alabama Supreme Court’s decision flouts a century of precedent on the Full Faith and Credit Clause and will have a devastating impact on Alabama adoptive families”. The Supreme Court reversed that decision Monday.
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The two women involved in the case are identified as E.L. and V.L in order to protect their privacy.
In December, the U.S. Supreme Court temporarily set aside the Alabama decision as the justices decided whether to hear the woman’s appeal. They established temporary residency in Georgia in order to gain these very rights.
The lone dissenter, Alabama Justice Greg Shaw, argued the Alabama Supreme Court did not have the right to determine whether or not Georgia applied its own laws correctly.
Gay marriage supporters hold a gay rights flag in front of the Supreme Court before a hearing about gay marriage in Washington, April 28, 2015.
The case went to the Alabama Supreme Court, which didn’t recognize the adoption in Georgia. “I thought that adopting them meant that we would be able to be together always”, the noncustodial parent known in court documents by the initials V.L. said in a statement issued by her attorney.
In a decision rendered Monday morning, the highest court in the land reversed a decision from the Alabama Supreme Court granting the birth mother the right to bar her former partner from adopting or visiting their children.
The children’s Guardian Ad Litem is Tobie J. Smith of the Legal Aid Society of Birmingham, who is represented by Marc Hearron of Morrison & Foerster LLP.
The two women were not married.
The court said in an unsigned opinion that the Alabama court was required to recognize the woman’s parental rights because they had been legally endorsed by a court in Georgia.
Tobias Barrington Wolff, Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, was a lead author on the amicus brief to the Supreme Court submitted on behalf of scholars of the Conflict of Laws-the field of law dealing with the operation of judgments across state borders.
“The Supreme Court’s reversal of Alabama’s unprecedented decision to void an adoption from another state is a victory not only for our client but for thousands of adopted families”, Cathy Sakimura, the family law director for NCLR said in a statement.
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Gay rights groups have said legal marriage will not solve myriad problems for gay parents, particularly those who were raising children together before the legalization of same-sex unions and then split up. With the family once again living in Alabama, E.L. argued that the 2007 Georgia adoption was invalid in the state. “These children have two parents, and should have the security that comes with legal recognition”.
