concluding that presumption of parentage statute, which expressly referred to a mother, father, and husband, violated equal protection as applied to a married lesbian couple to whom a child was born to one of the spouses during the couple’s marriage; identifying appropriate remedy by stating, “Accordingly, instead of striking section 144.13(2) from the [Iowa] Code, we will preserve it as to married opposite-sex couples and require the [Iowa Department of Public Health] to apply the statute to married lesbian couples”
How later courts described this case
- concluding that presumption of parentage statute, which expressly referred to a mother, father, and husband, violated equal protection as applied to a married lesbian couple to whom a child was born to one of the spouses during the couple’s marriage; identifying appropriate remedy by stating, “Accordingly, instead of striking section 144.13(2) from the [Iowa] Code, we will preserve it as to married opposite-sex couples and require the [Iowa Department of Public Health] to apply the statute to married lesbian couples”
- holding that refusal of Department of Public Health to identify the spouse of married same-sex couple as parent of child conceived by assisted reproduction violated guarantees of equal protection
- holding that in Iowa the putative parent is the equivalent of a biological parent, unless a person rebuts the presumption by “ ‘clear, strong, and satisfactory evidence’ ”
- holding the terms "paternity," "father," and "husband" were not exclusively within the expertise of the department and thus deference to agency interpretation would be overreaching
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
MANSFIELD, Justice
(concurring specially).
The Iowa Department of Public Health accepts the decision in Varnum v. Brien, 763 N.W.2d 862 (Iowa 2009), for purposes of this appeal. I agree that if Vamum is the law, then Iowa Code section 144.13(2) cannot be constitutionally applied to deny Melissa Gartner’s request to be listed as parent on the birth certificate of the child delivered by her same-sex spouse. Accordingly, I concur in the judgment in this case.
WATERMAN, J., joins this, special concurrence.