Way To Go Arkansas

Yesterday the Arkansas Supreme Court ruled that the state’s child welfare board could not ban homosexuals from becoming foster parents. Department of Human Services And Child Welfare Agency Review Board v. Matthew Lee Howard, et al. (No. 05-814, June 29, 2006). The board instituted the ban in 1999. The court noted that “the driving force behind adoption of the regulation was not to promote the health, safety, and welfare of foster children but rather based upon the board’s views of morality and its bias against homosexuals.”

The battle in Arkansas is probably not over. The court’s decision rested upon the separation of powers doctrine. The board was essentially legislating, which it is not allowed to do.

The opinion is worth reading, especially the factual findings of the lower court. For example:

10. The defendants are aware of “homosexuals,” as defined, who have served
as foster parents in Arkansas (Stipulated Facts, #27).
11. The defendants are not aware of any child whose health, safety, and/or
welfare has been endangered by the fact that such child’s foster parent, or
other household member, was “homosexual”, as defined (Stipulated Facts,
#28).
12. The State has no statistics indicating that gays are more prone to violence
than heterosexuals or that gay households are more unhealthy than
heterosexual households (Stipulated Facts, #30).
13. Based on its foster care statistics the defendants do not know of any reason
that lesbians and gay men would be unsuitable to be foster parents (Stipulated
Facts #31).
. . . .
23. The blanket exclusion may be harmful to promoting children’s healthy
adjustment because it excludes a pool of effective foster parents.
. . . .
29. Being raised by gay parents does not increase the risk of problems in
adjustment for children.
30. Being raised by gay parents does not increase the risk of psychological
problems for children.
31. Being raised by gay parents does not increase the risk of behavioral
problems.
32. Being raised by gay parents does not prevent children from forming
healthy relationships with their peers or others.
33. Being raised by gay parents does not cause academic problems.
34. Being raised by gay parents does not cause gender identity problems.
. . . .
37. Children of lesbian or gay parents are equivalently adjusted to children of
heterosexual parents.
38. There is no factual basis for making the statement that heterosexual
parents might be better able to guide their children through adolescence than
gay parents.
39. There is no factual basis for making the statement that the sexual
orientation of a parent or foster parent can predict children’s adjustment.
40. There is no factual basis for making the statement that being raised by
lesbian or gay parents has a negative effect on children’s adjustment.
41. There is no reason in which the health, safety, or welfare of a foster child
might be negatively impacted by being placed with a heterosexual foster parent
who has an adult gay family member residing in that home.
. . . .
46. There is no evidence that gay people, as a group, are more likely to engage
in domestic violence than heterosexuals.
47. There is no evidence that gay people, as a group, are more likely to
sexually abuse children than heterosexuals

In response to the decision the Arkansas Family Council (ha!) said it would push for legislation to reimpose the ban and would consider campaigning for a constitutional amendment in 2008.

Bring it on!

Alabama's Ban On Interracial Marriage

This is an old legal story, but one I followed closely at the time.
In Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1, the United States Supreme Court ruled that laws banning interracial marriage were unconstitutional. The decision came out on June 12 1967, and Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote the Court’s short opinion.
The State of Alabama’s Constitution prohibited interracial marriage, but, given the decision in Loving, the law was not enforced (and even in the several years before 1967 it probably wasn’t being enforced). In 2000, a proposition was placed on the Alabama ballot to repeal the law and erase discrimination from Alabama’s constitution. Alabama was the last state to still have such a law.
I don’t know the final tally (except that, thankfully, the proposition passed), but come election night, with 58 percent of the vote counted, 41 percent of the voters wanted the law to remain on the books!! When I followed this story in 2000 I found it, at first, humorous. Pretty quickly, though, I found it shocking instead.

Bodie's Birth Story, Volume III

I’m going to try to pick up the birth story where Marc left off. Marc might have to fill in or correct some of my details later on since I was on drugs at the time. But, I’ll try not to James Frey this thing too much!

Once the epidural starting wearing off on my right side, I was in a lot of pain. It felt like I had excruciating cramps in my hip. The nurse was going to call the anesthesiologist to turn up the epidural but my doctor wanted to check me first. From what I recall, I still wasn’t to 10 centimeters yet but my doctor manually forced me to 10 and told me start pushing. I was so happy because I thought it would be a few more hours before I could push. I just wanted to start pushing and get the delivery over. 

I started to push and, shortly thereafter, felt really nauseous. Even though I hadn’t eaten in awhile, I started throwing up. Marc was a champ and caught two little trays of my vomit! The pushing took a long time - about an hour and a half. It was exhausting but not very painful. At some point, the nurse left was doing other things and had Angela hold my other leg to help with the pushing. I had my eyes closed during most of the pushing but opened them one time and was surprised to see so many people in the room. Apparently, due to the earlier fetal decelerations, the NICU team had been called in. It turned out the decelerations were caused by the cord being around Bodie’s neck but it didn’t take long for my doctor to unwrap it and deliver him to the NICU team. Angela told me later that it didn’t take long for the NICU team to determine that he was perfect! It seemed to take forever though for them to bring him back to me! But, I finally got to hold him and was ecstatic. 

By the way, I don’t think giving birth is anything like a running marathon - that’s what everyone tells you going in - but I can say that the pushing felt like running a 5K over and over and over and over.

Sleep? What's That?

Well, there’s a least one person in the house who gets sleep. His name is Bodie. Mommy can only vaguely remember what it’s like to get more than a couple hours of sleep in a row. The time between nighttime feedings has gone from about 3 to 4 hours and it’s getting easier to get Bodie back to sleep afterwards. So, there is some hope on the horizon for Mommy! It’s funny how, in the pre-Bodie era, Mommy would be tired and grumpy and non-functioning if she only got 7 hours sleep. But, in the post-Bodie era, Mommy is functioning (although still tired and sometimes grumpy) on 7 hours of sleep broken up into 2 and 3 hour blocks. 

One more thing: It’s hard to care about the lack of sleep or to keep on my serious-it’s-not-playtime face when he smiles at me when I’m changing his diaper at 2 in the morning.