The California legislature advanced two bills recently that would provide greater protection and equality to lesbian families and others that don’t fit the “mom-dad-kids” mold.
The first, Senate Bill 1476, would allow judges to recognize that some children have more than two parents, as in the case of a lesbian couple and a sperm donor who also acted as a parent. The courts could recognize a third parent when it is in the child’s best interests to do so, but “only when there are more than two people who meet the definition of a parent under existing California law.” (See my previous post on this bill, which includes some comments about the similar law in British Columbia.)
The Assembly passed the bill August 27, after the Senate approved it earlier this year. It now goes back to the Senate for concurrence on amendments, and then to the governor.
The next day, the State Senate voted in favor of Assembly Bill 2356, which would give women in same-sex relationships and single women access to fertility services on the same terms as women in different-sex relationships. In short, different-sex couples have been able to use fresh sperm to inseminate when using fertility services, but other women must typically have their donor’s sperm frozen and quarantined for up to six months.
The bill will move in the opposite direction as the first one above, and head back to the Assembly (which already approved it) for concurrence before proceeding to the governor.
Personally, I think that Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom and war who appears on the California State Seal, is smiling at all this. She always seemed a little butch to me, what with the armor and all.