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Sex, Marriage, Medicine, And Law: 'What Hope Of Harmony?', Thomas Wm. Mayo

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

This essay offers a critique of the Kansas Supreme Court's decision in In re Estate of Gardiner, 42 P.3d 120 (Kan. 2002), and similar cases that hold that for purposes of the opposite-sex marriage rule, an individual's sex is determined at birth, is genetically fixed, and cannot be changed through surgery or hormone therapy. The result for transgendered individuals is a legal regime that is hostile to medical care that brings external sex characteristics into line with sexual identity. The result for society is a legal rule that is at odds with scientific opinion. Finally, the result for the opposite-sex …