Domestic Partnership in The United States

Domestic Partnership In The United States

Performed in some jurisdictions

Brazil: BA
Mexico: DF, QR
United States: CT, DC, IA, MA, MD†, ME†, NH, NY, VT, WA, Coquille, Suquamish

Recognized, not performed

Brazil
Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten
Israel
Mexico:
United States: CA, RI

Civil unions and
registered partnerships

Andorra
Austria
Brazil
Colombia
Czech Republic
Ecuador
Finland
France
Germany
Greenland

Hungary
Ireland
Isle of Man
Jersey
Liechtenstein
Luxembourg
New Zealand
Slovenia
Switzerland
United Kingdom
Uruguay

Performed in some jurisdictions

Australia: ACT, NSW, QLD, TAS, VIC
Mexico: COA
United States: CA, CO, DE, HI, IL, NJ, NV, OR, RI, WI
Venezuela: Mérida

Unregistered cohabitation

Australia
Croatia

Israel

See also

Same-sex union legislation
Timeline of same-sex marriage
Recognition of same-sex unions in Europe
Recognition of same-sex unions in South America
Marriage privatization
Domestic partnership
Military policy
Listings by country

†Note: Law not yet in effect LGBT portal

In the United States of America, domestic partnership is a city-, county-, state-, or employer-recognized status that may be available to same-sex couples and, sometimes, opposite-sex couples. Although similar to marriage, a domestic partnership does not confer any of the 1,138 rights afforded to married couples by the federal government. Domestic partnerships in the United States are determined by each state or local jurisdiction, so there is no nationwide consistency on the rights, responsibilities, and benefits accorded domestic partners.

Couples who live in localities without civil unions or domestic partnerships may voluntarily enter into a private, informal domestic partnership agreement, specifying their mutual obligations; however, this involves drawing up a number of separate legal documents, including wills, power of attorney, healthcare directives, child custody agreements, etc., and is best done with the guidance of a local attorney.

In any case, without legislation to enforce the agreement, all such provisions of the partnership may be ignored by hospitals, healthcare professionals, or other persons, and may be held invalid by state courts in disputes over child custody or over a deceased partner's estate.

Read more about Domestic Partnership In The United States:  Terminology, Legal Rights, Employment Benefits, Cities and Counties With Domestic Partnership Registries, Similar Legal Status Classifications

Famous quotes containing the words united states, domestic, partnership, united and/or states:

    Today’s difference between Russia and the United States is that in Russia everybody takes everybody else for a spy, and in the United States everybody takes everybody else for a criminal.
    Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)

    The immense majority of human biographies are a gray transit between domestic spasm and oblivion.
    George Steiner (b. 1929)

    Nevertheless, no school can work well for children if parents and teachers do not act in partnership on behalf of the children’s best interests. Parents have every right to understand what is happening to their children at school, and teachers have the responsibility to share that information without prejudicial judgment.... Such communication, which can only be in a child’s interest, is not possible without mutual trust between parent and teacher.
    Dorothy H. Cohen (20th century)

    ... it is probable that in a fit of generosity the men of the United States would have enfranchised its women en masse; and the government now staggering under the ballots of ignorant, irresponsible men, must have gone down under the additional burden of the votes which would have been thrown upon it, by millions of ignorant, irresponsible women.
    Jane Grey Swisshelm (1815–1884)

    Action from principle, the perception and the performance of right, changes things and relations; it is essentially revolutionary, and does not consist wholly with anything which was. It not only divides States and churches, it divides families; ay, it divides the individual, separating the diabolical in him from the divine.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)