The Greatest Lie Part 11

I smiled, pleased that he had remembered to use my new name, and stated the case:

"The case involves J'Noel Gardiner's claim to the estate of Marshall G. Gardiner. J'Noel was born male, had sex reassignment surgery and had an amended Wisconsin birth certificate showing her gender as "assigned female." Marshall, an elderly widower, was a donor to the college where J'Noel was a professor. He fell in love and married her with knowledge of her past. Gardiner died without leaving a will the following summer.

Gardiner's estranged son sought to claim the entire estate, arguing that the marriage was invalid. Kansas had passed a version of the Defense of Marriage Act, by which the state forbids recognition of same-sex marriages. Joe argued that as a matter of law J'Noel, as a genetic male, was incapable of legally marrying his late father.

The trial court agreed with Joe, ruling that under Kansas law, anyone born male remains male, and ignored the Wisconsin birth certificate.

The Kansas court of appeals reversed, finding that the district court had improperly determined as a matter of law that J'Noel remained a man. The lower court needed to conduct a trial about whether J'Noel was male or female, based on the scientific and medical factors relevant to determination of gender.

The Kansas Supreme Court reversed the appellate court. Even though the terms "sex," "male" and "female" were not defined in the Kansas "protection of marriage" statute, the held that J'Noel's sex was male, based on definitions taken from an old edition of Webster's Dictionary, which looked to genetic and biological factors only.

I read the holding:

"'A male-to-female post-operative transsexual does not fit the definition of a female. The male organs have been removed, but the ability to 'produce ova and bear offspring' does not and never did exist. There is no womb, cervix, or ovaries, nor is there any change in his chromosomes. As Texas supreme court had held in the earlier Littleton case, the transsexual still 'inhabits. a male body in all aspects other than what the physicians have supplied.' J'Noel does not fit the common meaning of female. If the legislature intended to include transsexuals, it could have been a simple matter to have done so."