The Nebraska Supreme Court has rejected the state’s appeal of a ruling that struck down longstanding Nebraska policy banning same-sex couples from serving as foster parents or adopting wards of the state.
Friday’s opinion came in the 2013 lawsuit of three same-sex couples who sued over the policy.
A judge ruled in the couples’ favor in 2015, declaring the policy unconstitutional.
The state appealed, arguing – among other things – that the matter was moot, because the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services had quietly stopped enforcing the policy in 2012.
But the state’s high court said the lower court’s ruling was necessary, adding that the department’s 1995 discriminatory policy was “legally indistinguishable from a sign reading ‘whites only’ on the hiring-office door.”
AP
