The Human Rights Campaign assailed a ruling last week by a federal judge that upheld Florida's discriminatory ban on lesbian and gay adoptions.
"This is a tragic ruling that will leave children without the loving parents and the secure homes they need," said Lisa Bennett, HRC's deputy director of FamilyNet. "Numerous studies show that gay and lesbian families are just as capable of raising healthy, happy children as any other family."
The federal judge in the case, James Lawrence King, agreed with the state's argument that the law was in the best interest of children, saying that married heterosexuals provide children with a more secure home. "Plaintiffs have not asserted that they can demonstrate that homosexual families are equivalently stable, are able to provide proper gender identification or are no more socially stigmatizing than married heterosexual families," said King, senior judge for the Miami-based U.S. Southern District of Florida.
"The only way to determine what is in the best interest of a child is to make these important adoption decisions on a case-by-case basis," said Bennett.
The judge did reject the state's assertion that the law banning gay adoptions is valid because it signals the state's disapproval of homosexuality.
"The Court cannot accept that moral disapproval of homosexuals or homosexuality serves a legitimate state interest," wrote King. A spokesperson for Gov. Jeb Bush said that he supports the ruling. Florida is the only state to statutorily ban lesbian and gay individuals from adopting.
"We are surprised and deeply disappointed by today's decision. We also think the decision is wrong. This judge admitted that the gay families in this case have the same relationships that biological parents and their children have. But he said that didn't matter. They aren't protected by the Constitution," said Matt Coles, Director of the ACLU Lesbian & Gay Rights Project, which brought the lawsuit on behalf of five gay men and two foster children.
"The judge also said it's just fine for the state to allow people who everyone knows pose a real threat to children-- like substance abusers and child abusers-- to apply to adopt but at the same time to bar gay men and lesbians from applying. With all due respect to the Judge, we think the constitution's promise of due process and equality means more than that. In the next few days, we will file a motion for reconsideration with the judge. We'll assess our options after he has ruled on that," Coles said.
"This was never about whether married couples provide a better home than gay couples who cannot marry. In fact, 25% of the children in Florida who are adopted out of foster care go to single parents; in Miami/Dade County, it's 40%. This case was about the fact that lesbians and gay men provide all of the love, support and guidance children need-- but because they're gay, that's not happening in Florida," added Coles.
"There are 3,400 children in Florida who are waiting to be adopted. As a result of this decision, many of them will spend their entire childhood being bounced from one temporary placement to another, when they could have had real homes. We'll leave the question of who is moral to those who made that happen."
Meanwhile, Reuters Health reports that "gay and lesbian couples make as good parents as heterosexual couples, according to findings from a national survey on gay parenting presented [ Aug. 25 ] at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association." The data suggests lesbian and "gay parents are more responsive, child-oriented and egalitarian" than heterosexual parents, said Nanette Silverman, a researcher at Dowling College in New York.
The National Survey of Gay and Lesbian Parents was conducted by Suzanne Johnson, associate professor of psychology at Dowling College, and Elizabeth O'Connor. The survey identified 415 lesbian or gay parents raising children across the U.S. They found the lesbians, on average, had been together 10 years and had a 5-year-old child, while the men had been together 13 years and had a 6-year-old.
