Lamda Legal Argues Same-Sex Hospital Visitation Lawsuit

Miami Hospital Tries To Block Lawsuit In Hospital Visitation Case

It’s hard to believe that in this day a hospital will block someone from seeing their partner, especially when all of the medical powers of attorney paperwork are in place and properly signed and notarized. It’s harder still to believe that such a hospital would continue to defend its inhuman policies.

The case began in February 2007, when Janice Langbehn and her partner Lisa Marie Pond, with three of their four children, were in Miami, Florida preparing for a cruise to celebrate their eighteenth anniversary. But before the cruise could leave port, Lisa Marie suffered a massive stroke and was taken to Jackson Memorial. Hospital personnel refused to let Langbehn into Pond’s hospital room, even after a legal power of attorney was faxed to the hospital. Pond was pronounced dead of a brain aneurysm about eighteen hours after being admitted to the hospital. The only time Langbehn was allowed to see her partner was when a priest was giving her last rites.

Read the Story, Box Turtle Bulletin

MERI APPLAUDS FORMER U.S. REP. BOB BARR

(Cranston, RI) Now that the author of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) has reversed his opinion, Marriage Equality RI calls for this discriminatory law to be repealed.

The former U.S. Rep from Georgia and 2008 Libertarian party’s nominee for President has come to realize that the intention of his legislation in 1996, which was to meet principles of federalism, never materialized. Federalism calls for federal, state and local governments to interact cooperatively and collectively to solve common problems, rather than creating policies separately or clashing over a policy in a system dominated by the federal government.

In Barr’s LA Times editorial (January 5, 2009), he stated, “In effect, DOMA’s language reflects one-way federalism: It protects only those states that don’t want to accept a same-sex marriage granted by another state. Moreover, the heterosexual definition of marriage for purposes of federal laws… has become a de facto club used to limit, if not thwart, the ability of a state to choose to recognize same-sex unions… It is time to get the federal government out of the marriage business. In law and policy, such decisions should be left to the people themselves.”

Barr also echoes President-elect Obama’s 2006 vote against the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment (also referred to as the Marriage Protection Amendment), which defines marriage as union of one man and one woman. Barr further stated, “He (Obama) was right then; and as I have come to realize, he is right now in concluding that DOMA has to go.”

“The federal DOMA has long been an unfair strangler of state’s rights and Marriage Equality RI calls on Congress to repeal this law,” said Susan Heroux, MERI Board Chair. “This law has a direct negative effect on married same-sex couples living and working in RI who are forced to take actions such as filing their taxes under the single category… This law causes a legal nightmare for those of us who are married because our marriages are recognized on the state level but not the federal level. DOMA has always been used to discriminate against gay people and it is time for it to go.”

Recently re-elected Rep. Frank Ferri, the first openly gay, married R.I. state legislator commented, “DOMA’s purpose was to directly prevent U.S. citizens from their inalienable rights guaranteed by the constitution. Fortunately the backers of this legislation are now realizing the damage that such laws have on the foundation of our great nation. “

Hans Johnson, President of Progressive Victory and a contributing editor to In These Times magazine, recently noted, “Conservative opposition to marriage equality continues to crumble. The ferocity of extremists who insist on intruding into the lives of committed same-sex couples and denying basic equality to gay people is turning some true conservatives into allies.”

Love Stories: Pam Brightman and Essjay Foulkrod

“In their Oakland Beach bungalow, above the sofa where Pam Brightman and Essjay Foulkrod sit, hangs a print. It’s titled “Confidences,” by Harry Wilson Watrous (1857-1940). On the frame is a little gold plaque bearing the inscription: “A little talk there was of me and thee … ” from The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam…”

Read Pam and Essjay’s Love Story on the Providence Journal website.

GLAD Announces “6×12”

Tuesday, on the fifth anniversary of the Goodridge decision, GLAD announced the goal of “Six by Twelve”: ensuring that same-sex couples in all six New England states will be able to marry in their home state by 2012.

“We can make New England a marriage equality zone by strategically combining existing legal, electoral, and on-the-ground know-how to fast-track marriage in every New England state,” said GLAD Executive Director Lee Swislow. “By 2012 we not only can have marriage equality throughout New England, we can have a road map for the rest of the country.”

GLAD’s press release

Saving Marriage Review in the Projo

Pro gay-marriage film extraordinary, yet bittersweet
By Michael Janusonis

Tomorrow night’s screening at the Rhode Island School of Design Auditorium of the documentary, Saving Marriage, about the struggle to allow gays and lesbians to marry in Massachusetts, was designed to celebrate the recent ruling by the Connecticut Supreme Court to allow gay marriages in that state.

But it may turn out to be a bittersweet event for organizers, the Marriage Equality Rhode Island Education Fund, which hopes to bring gay marriage to the Ocean State. For on Nov. 4, voters in California passed Proposition 8, which defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman, by a 52-percent margin. The passage of Proposition 8 ended gay marriages which had been performed in California, following a court decision there, after only several months.

Read the rest of the review

Keith Olbermann’s Special Comment

A special comment from Keith Olbermann on the subject of Prop 8: Gay marriage is a question of love.