Louisiana Must Issue New Birth Certificate for Child Adopted by Gay Couple

Lambda Legal has won a ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Jay C. Zainey (E.D.La.), requiring Louisiana officials to issue a new birth certificate for a Louisiana-born child who was adopted in a New York State court by a gay male couple now living in San Diego, California.  The December 22, 2008, decision does not provide many human interest details about the case, other than to note that two men, Oren Adar and Mickey Ray Smith, jointly adopted the child in New York and currently live in San Diego.  Because the child was born in Shreveport, Louisiana, they applied to Louisiana authorities to obtain a birth certificate with the child's new surname, identifying the two men as the child's legal parents.  They alleged that the refusal by Louisiana officials to issue the certificate has already caused problems for them in getting the child included as a beneficiary of an employee-based group health insurance plan as the child of one of the men.

Relying on an advisory opinion from the Attorney General of Louisiana, who appears to have allowed politics to interfere with objective legal research in forming an opinion, the State Registrar refused to issue the certificate.  The purported basis for the objection was that Louisiana does not allow unmarried couples to adopt children, so it would violate the public policy of the state to issue a birth certificate showing two men as the parents this child.  The state argued that it may invoke a "public policy exception" to the obligations imposed by the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the federal Constitution to honor court judgments (including adoption decrees) issued in other states.

Judge Zainey pointed out that the state's position violates the plain language of its own statute governing the issue.  Louisiana's statute on out-of-state adoptions specifies that state officials are to issue a new birth certificate for any Louisiana-born child who is adopted out of state, upon being presented with official documentation of the adoption.  The new certificate is supposed to list the adoptive parent or parents, and to be issue under the adoptive name of the adoptee.  The statute does not refer to any exceptions.

The Attorney General tried to argue that other statutes that would make this adoption impossible in Louisiana provided a basis to refuse to issue the certificate, but Judge Zainey disagreed, pointing out that although there have been cases where states have been upheld in refusing to give effect to statutes from other jurisdictions on grounds of public policy, there is no recognized public policy exception for lawful judgements by the courts of other states.  U.S. Supreme Court decisions were summoned in support of this point, as well as the important recent ruling in Finstuen v. Crutcher, 496 F.3d 1139, 1153 (10th Cir. 2007), which although not binding on Judge Zainey, was nonetheless held to be an instructive precedent.  In Finstuen, the appeals court invalidated an Oklahoma statute that barred the state from recognizing out-of-state adoptions by unmarried couples.

Given their determined opposition, it seems likely that the Louisiana officials will appeal this ruling to the 5th Circuit, but the case law on Full Faith and Credit for adoption decrees is solid so such an appeal could certainly be deemed frivolous.  Judge Zainey's opinion granted the plaintiff's motion for summary judgment, ordering the state officials to issue the birth certificate, but did not discuss the plaintiffs' alternative legal argument that the refusal to issue the new certificate violated their right to equal protection of the laws.