By Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services via Arizona Capitol Times
Saying all marriages are created equal, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled today that the spouse of a gay woman who has given birth is entitled to the same parental rights as if she had been a man.
Chief Justice Scott Bales, writing for the majority, acknowledged that Arizona laws dealing with presumption of paternity use terms like “father,” “he” and “man.” Those laws say the husband in a marriage is presumed to be the parent of any child born within 10 months of a marriage.
He conceded that Suzan McLaughlin could not possibly be biologically related to the child born in 2010 to Kimberly McLaughlin, to whom she was legally married at the time.
