It was in April 207 when the Court of Appeals ruled that employers were not allowed to discriminate against employees due to their sexual orientation under the Civil Rights Act. The ruling was voted at an 8 to 3 split. At this time, Ivy Tech stated that they would not go through the process of appealing this decision.
This was a historic ruling that was able to protect the employment rights of a lot of people in the state. They would no longer have to worry about losing their jobs just on their sexual and gender identity at the time. The court made the decision that this kind of discrimination would violate the rights of the person based on federal law. However, the ruling was only binding in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Illinois.
Of course, there were some religious objections to all of this. In 2015, Governor Mike Pence signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. This signing meant that there was a lot of protesting about it, but it was uncertain whether the language in the act was unclear or if it was meaning to discriminate against those with same-sex orientation or not.
Adoption and Parenting
The statutes of Indiana do allow a single LGBT person to adopt if they so choose. The state Court of Appeals ruled that in 2006 that unmarried couples, including same-sex couples, are allowed to adopt as well. Local courts seem to also support the right of a same-sex partner to adopt their partner’s child, whether that child is adopted or biological.
In 2005, the Court of Appeals in Indiana ruled unanimously that lesbian partners who agreed together to conceive a child through artificial insemination are both the legal parents of any children that were born out of that action. Indiana law does allow any woman, regardless of their sexual orientation, to go through artificial insemination. The spouse of a pregnant woman is usually the one who is seen as the parent of the child through Indiana law, whether they are heterosexual or same-sex.
Then in 2016, a federal judge ruled that Indiana was required to allow same-sex couples to put both of their names down on the birth certificate of any child. This was a result of a lawsuit of a eight different same-sex couples who were angry they couldn’t list the non-gestational parents name on the birth certificate of their children due to the current laws of the time.
Same Sex and LGBT Rights in Indiana
There has been a lot of turmoil over the years due to some of the rights that individuals in the LGBT community have been able to enjoy. While the laws of the state of Indiana are way more liberal than they were in the past, they still have a long way to go compared to what some other states are offering at the time. There is still a lot of work to do, but members of the LGBT community are able to enjoy quite a few rights that were not possible just a few generations ago.
