## Facts

- Heather Martin Gartner and Melissa Gartner were in a long-term relationship and later married in Iowa while Heather was pregnant with their second child.
- Their child, MacKenzie Jean Gartner, was born during the marriage.
- Iowa Code § 144.13(2) directed that when a mother is married at conception, birth, or any time in between, the “name of her husband” be entered on the birth certificate as the father absent a court determination otherwise.
- The Iowa Department of Public Health issued MacKenzie’s birth certificate listing only Heather (the birth mother) and left the other-parent line blank.
- The Gartners asked the Department to list Melissa (the nonbirthing spouse) as a parent based on the marital presumption of parentage.
- The Department refused, reasoning the statute required listing only a “husband” and that Melissa would have to adopt the child to be listed.

## Issues

1. Whether Iowa Code § 144.13(2) can be interpreted, as a matter of statutory construction, to require listing the nonbirthing female spouse in a same-sex marriage as a parent on a child’s birth certificate.
2. Whether applying § 144.13(2) to deny married lesbian couples the marital presumption of parentage on birth certificates violates the equal protection guarantees of article I, sections 1 and 6 of the Iowa Constitution.

## Decision

- The Iowa Supreme Court declined to construe § 144.13(2)’s reference to “husband” as, by interpretation alone, encompassing a female spouse.
- The court held that § 144.13(2), as applied to married lesbian couples, violated Iowa constitutional equal protection.
- The court affirmed the judgment requiring the Department to issue a corrected birth certificate listing both Heather and Melissa as parents.
- The court directed the district court to lift its stay affecting similarly situated couples and remanded for agency action consistent with the ruling.

## Legal Principles

- Iowa’s equal protection clauses prohibit the State from granting opposite-sex married couples a marital presumption of parentage on birth certificates while withholding an equivalent presumption from same-sex married couples.
- Sexual-orientation classifications under the Iowa Constitution are subject to heightened scrutiny; the State must show sufficiently important interests and a substantial relationship between those interests and the differential treatment.
- Administrative interests in record accuracy, efficiency, or facilitating paternity determinations do not justify requiring an additional adoption proceeding for a nonbirthing spouse in a same-sex marriage when opposite-sex spouses receive the presumption without biological verification in many cases.
- A statute may be left intact on its face yet be unconstitutional “as applied,” requiring equal treatment in its operation without judicial rewriting of its text.

## Conclusion

The court required Iowa to extend the marital presumption of parentage used for opposite-sex spouses on birth certificates to married lesbian spouses, holding that denying that presumption and forcing adoption as a condition of recognition violates Iowa equal protection as applied.


Gartner v. Iowa Dep’t of Pub. Health, 830 N.W.2d 335 (Iowa 2013)