In the summer of , the city of Somerville, Massachusetts, passed the first multiple-partner domestic partnership ordinance in the country. The adjacent city of Cambridge followed suit, passing its own multiple-partner domestic partnership ordinance in PLAC lawyers worked closely with city officials to make the Cambridge registration process accessible by omitting the cost-prohibitive requirement that all persons in the partnership live together.
With these untested ordinances come new questions. Additionally, the criminalization of multiple-partner relationships through antibigamy and antipolygamy statutes may represent a roadblock to ordinances. Nonetheless, there may be unexplored constitutional protections for legally recognizing multiple-partner domestic partnerships. This Note examines potential legal challenges to multiple-partner domestic partnership ordinances.
Part I describes communities that the ordinances serve, characterizes the discrimination and harassment that communities face, and explains what CNM people will gain from the passage of these ordinances. Part III evaluates approaches for addressing challenges that the ordinances may face at the municipal, state, and federal levels, such as legislative advocacy and litigation based on gay rights precedents.
This Part clarifies who the CNM community is, how its members suffer from discrimination, and why CNM β in particular, polyamorous β individuals will benefit from multiple-partner domestic partnership ordinances. Somerville, Cambridge, and Arlington passed ordinances when structurally diverse families called attention to the discrimination that they face.
Polyamory involves intimacy with more than one person with the consent and knowledge of all parties. With that visibility comes hardship. Over half of people in the CNM community have reported workplace, housing, and other forms of discrimination. And a lot of people see that as dangerous. First, multiple-partner domestic partnership ordinances may soften stigma. The rights enshrined in multiple-partner domestic partnerships preserve the dignity of structurally diverse families while tangibly improving their lives.
