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It was standing-room only Tuesday as the Utah Supreme Court considered the future of a 3-year-old girl raised in a lesbian relationship.
The child's biological mother, Cheryl Pike Barlow, says she has left the gay lifestyle and doesn't want her former partner - joined to her in a Vermont civil union - to see her daughter anymore.
"I am here to protect my child," said Barlow. "That's the only reason."
Keri Lynne Jones, of Taylorsville, says she is fighting to maintain a relationship with the daughter the couple decided to have together, once raised together, and gave both of their surnames.
"We aren't the only family like this," Jones said. "It just seems that it should matter that we created her together."
The justices must now decide if Utah visitation laws protect gay or unmarried couples raising children related by blood to only one partner. At issue is a common law doctrine known as "in loco parentis," in which a person acts as a parent although they have no blood or legal ties to a child.
Third District Judge Timothy Hanson ruled in December the doctrine applied to Jones and awarded her visitation, saying the girl would benefit "both emotionally and financially" from the contact.
Hanson determined Jones had been an "equal partner" in the decision for Barlow to have a child, sharing in the selection of the sperm donor. Jones participated in the child's birth and care, and became a co-guardian, the judge said.
The women broke up when the girl was 2, after Jones had an affair with another woman.
Barlow's attorney, Frank Mylar, told the justices Tuesday that the parental rights of all Utahns are at stake in the case. Affiliated with the Alliance Defense Fund, which litigates cases involving religion, Mylar argued the in loco parentis doctrine only applies to cases where the parent is absent from the child's life.
"This case is about the right of a natural mother to decide what is best for her child," he told the high court. "My client decided what she thought was best for her 2-year-old child and left a relationship and a lifestyle."
Attorney Kathryn Kendell, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, said the case hinges on "well-settled" Utah law protecting the relationships children have with those who have acted as their parents.
"While this happens to involve a same-sex couple, how one feels about same-sex parents is irrelevant," she said. "If this had been a heterosexual relationship, the same claim would be pressed."
Yet Kendell, representing Jones, also told the justices they have the power to protect her client.
"The court has an important function to protect the rights of individuals, even if those rights are unpopular," she said.
Chief Justice Christine M. Durham summed up the task before the high court as determining how to apply decades-old law from previous cases to a set of contemporary family relation- ships.
"To the extent that a parent deliberately constructs a co-parenting situation . . . why shouldn't that parent be responsible for the consequences of creating that relationship?" Durham asked.
Tuesday's arguments made for a lively debate, with each one of the justices jumping in.
Justice Ronald E. Nehring asked if circumstances would be different had the girl been 10 years old, with a presumably stronger tie to Jones when the couple split up. Justice Jill N. Parrish questioned how much weight courts should place on the intent of parents who set up a relationship.
Justice Michael J. Wilkins inquired whether the case involved a public policy question best left to lawmakers. Attending Tuesday's arguments was attorney and Utah state Rep. LaVar Christensen, R-Draper. He called Jones' position an abuse of in loco parentis and said "legislation would be appropriate" should Barlow lose.
Barlow, once known as a gay rights activist in Utah, said she feels her daughter has become a pawn in the movement she once took part in. With family members and supporters from her church nearby, she warned: "If this goes through, [gay] adoption is next, [eliminating] the constitutional [anti-gay marriage] amendment is next."
She said she has abandoned what she called a "revolving door" of lesbian relationships.
"I did not find happiness or much health there," she said. "I pray that I will meet a man that will be able to understand my past."
Barlow added she has always been a religious person. "I looked at the last 20 years of my life and my beautiful daughter and said the next 20 years are not going to look like the past 20 years."
Barlow argues she was the primary caretaker of her daughter as a stay-at-home mother and that Jones had little to do with raising her daughter.
She says visitation that has occurred since she moved from Utah to Texas in May has been traumatic for her daughter, who is having nightmares and calling several people "Mommy."
Jones says she was kept away from the girl for almost a year when the litigation began. She contends Barlow was able to be a stay-at-home mom only with her support, tearfully recalling mornings with the girl and picking her up from day care
When the girl was 1 year old, Jones said, the couple began trying for a second child. This time the plan was for her to become pregnant, she said. The two tried for one year before the relationship ended, Jones said.
Following Tuesday's arguments, Barlow's brother gave Jones a warm hug.
"I think that they're torn, the same as my family," said Jones. "We had a wedding, and our families were joined together on holidays."
Judge Hanson awarded Jones two days a month and Christmas Day visitation, with visitation increasing to alternating overnight weekends this summer. Jones has been paying $300 per month in child support in accordance with the judge's order, and half of all medical expenses since December.
But Barlow is now charged with custodial interference, a third-degree felony, for not following the judge's ruling shortly after she moved to Texas in May. Barlow was arraigned in that case Tuesday, and a follow-up hearing is set for Sept. 13. Jones has visited the girl three times, in a hotel, in the past two months.
The justices are considering Barlow's appeal in the visitation case and will make their ruling at a later date.