News & Commentary

The past two years have been the deadliest for transgender people in recent history, in large part due to the rapidly increasing number of legislative attacks against trans peoples’ rights and the resurgence of demeaning and harmful anti-trans rhetoric in our communities. Kansas is no exception.

Organization wants to eliminate fees for children and legalize medical marijuana

On Thursday May 12th, the ACLU of Kansas submitted opposition testimony to proposed changes to K.A.R. 28-17-20, an administrative policy which relates to the process for making changes to birth certificates.

Great news!After organizations from across the state came together to oppose SB 175, Kansas House Speaker Ray Merrick announced yesterday that he does not plan to debate the bill, a bill that would force universities to use public funding to support discriminatory student organizations.The ACLU of Kansas, Equality of Kansas, National Organization for Women, Americans United, Mainstream Coalition, as well as student voices and faith leaders from across Kansas proved that this discrimination is not acceptable for the state of Kansas.Thank you for your support on this issue! Your voice matters.

The ACLU of Kansas promises to push forward on Kansas marriage lawsuit after the U.S. Supreme Court takes cases.Doug Bonney, legal director for the ACLU of Kansas, said nothing would likely change while the nation’s highest court considers several marriage-related cases. The U.S. Supreme Court announced Friday it had decided to take cases related to state same-sex marriage bans. The court will likely issue a ruling this spring.“We are certainly going to continue to press forward to try to get final judgments in our case,” Bonney said.Read the entire article on the Topeka Capital-Journal from January 16, 2015.

Remarks at the Equality Kansas rally by ACLU of Kansas executive Director Gary Brunk."The road our nation has traveled in the quest to expand liberties has never been straight or easy.  The Declaration of Independence boldly asserted that all men are created equal, but the Constitution condoned slavery.  As historian Garry Wills convincingly argues, at Gettysburg President Lincoln had to leapfrog back over the Constitution to the Declaration to restore the centrality of the idea “that all men are created equal.”  Even then, it was many decades after Gettysburg before we began making real progress in the struggle for equality for African-Americans, just as it took decades before we made real progress in the struggle for equality for women.   Today we can acknowledge that the fulfillment of rights of Africa-Americans and women has improved, but we still have a long way to go before we are near the end of the road to equality.And so it is for other groups marginalized and discriminated against in our society.  In the last few years our country has taken astonishing steps towards equality for LGBT people.  I am proud to say that the ACLU has played a critical role in that progress, including our historic victory in convincing the Supreme Court  that the Defense of Marriage Act violated equal protection by denying married gay couples recognition under federal law.We have made progress, but much remains to be done. Hardly anywhere is that as true as in our own state, where under the guise of religious liberty some legislators want to legalize discrimination against LGBT couples.But this fight in Kansas is not about religious liberty, it’s about giving persons with certain convictions the right to impose their views on others.  This is, pure and simple, an attempt to institutionalize the tyranny of a set of ideas that increasingly most Americans reject.Today, as civil libertarians, as people who are religious, as people who are not religious but care about working to fulfill the promise of the Declaration of Independence, we are called on

Under the guise of “religious freedom,” Kansas House Bill 2453 would allow discrimination against LGBT people.  The opposition to the bill has been tremendous, coming from not only advocates and citizens who believe in equality, but also from concerned business leaders.  While the legislation seems derailed for the time being, the ACLU will be watching closely for attempts to revive it. 

The ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri is proud to launch the 4th Edition of the Kansas/Missouri LGBT Rights Handbook. The primary purpose of the handbook is simply to provide information.  Through the process of writing and updating it, we realize that, while progress is being made a great deal of work lies ahead.  The ACLU will continue participating in this crucial struggle to secure the civil rights and civil liberties of the LGBT community.4th Edition LGBT Handbook

On Friday, February 22, 2013, the Kansas Supreme Court issued its opinion in Frazier v. Goudschaal, a case raising important issues for lesbian and gay parents and their children.   The Court ruled that, when a same-sex couple has children together, Kansas parentage laws apply equally to women and non-biological parents, and that courts must consider the reality of who a child’s parents are in order to protect the best interests of children.  Significantly, the Court also ruled that an agreement to co-parent and share custody is enforceable if it is in the best interests of the children.Marci Frazier and Kelly Goudschaal were in a same-sex relationship and decided to have children together through insemination. Kelly was the birth mother for their two children.  After the children were born, Marci and Kelly raised them for years as co-parents. Marci and Kelley gave the children hyphenated last names, and the two mothers signed a written agreement saying that they both intended to be parents and share custody of the children. Unfortunately, the relationship between Kelly and Marci broke down in 2008. They co-parented the children for a period of time after separation, but then Kelly cut off contact between Marci and the children.After Marci went to court to try to see the children again, a Kansas trial court granted joint custody to the two women. Kelly appealed this order and argued that Marci was not a parent and had no right to seek custody. The Kansas Supreme Court upheld the lower court’s ruling and explained that both women could be legally recognized as parents under Kansas law.With this decision, Kansas joins a number of other states in ruling that when two people bring a child into the world and raise that child as co-parents, the law should recognize that both people are the child’s parents, regardless of gender or biology. These courts have recognized that a child’s need for family stability depends on the existence of a legally protected relationship with both parents. This ruling is significant not only for same-sex parents, but also for many kinds of families where non-biological parents are raising children.The ACLU Foundation of Kansas and Western Missouri partnered with the ACLU LGBT Project and the National Center for Lesbian Rights in submitting a friend of the court brief to the Kansas Supreme Court in support of Marci Frazier.  Rose A. Saxe, Senior Staff Attorney with the ACLU LGBT Project, with the help of Cathy Sakimura of the National Center for Lesbian Rights wrote our amicus brief, and Legal Director Doug Bonney served as local counsel.