RICHMOND, VA – The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, which has jurisdiction over North Carolina and four other states, will hear oral arguments Tuesday, May 13, in a case challenging Virginia’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples. The case will be argued in Richmond, Virginia, by James Esseks, Director of the ACLU’s LGBT & AIDS Project, among others. On February 14, 2014, a federal judge ruled that Virginia’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples is unconstitutional, but the ruling has been suspended while it is being appealed. A Fourth Circuit ruling on that case, Bostic v. Rainey, could have an impact on North Carolina’s similar marriage ban.   

In North Carolina, the American Civil Liberties Union and ACLU of North Carolina Legal Foundation have filed two federal lawsuits challenging North Carolina’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples, both in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina in Greensboro. The first, Fisher-Borne et al. v. Smith, was filed in July 2013 as an amended complaint to a 2012 lawsuit challenging North Carolina’s ban on second parent adoptions on behalf of six families across the state headed by same-sex couples. On April 9, 2014, the ACLU filed a second federal lawsuit, Gerber and Berlin et al. v. Cooper, on behalf of three married, same-sex couples seeking state recognition of their marriages. Because of the serious medical condition of one member of each couple, they are asking the court to take swift action.

The ACLU has filed an amicus curiae, or “friend-of-the-court” brief, in the Bostic case before the Fourth Circuit on behalf of its North Carolina clients who are raising children. The brief highlights particular harms that North Carolina’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples has on families and children, including denial of medical decision-making in an emergency, Social Security Insurance survivor benefits, the ability to provide children with quality health insurance of the non-legal parents, detrimental tax status, and denial of veteran’s benefits, among others.

“[These couples and their children] and other families like them in North Carolina are living proof that such bans – often erroneously touted as protecting the interests of children – instead cause severe hardship to children and families,” the brief argues.

Read the ACLU’s amicus brief in the Virginia case.

Read more about Fisher-Borne et al. v. Smith.

Read more about Gerber and Berlin et al. v. Cooper.