DETROIT, Feb. 25 (UPI) -- Lawyers focused on whether having parents of the same sex affects children as a trial opened Tuesday of a challenge to Michigan's ban on homosexual marriage.
About 60 protesters gathered outside the federal courthouse before the proceedings began, the Detroit Free Press reported.
"The state of Michigan's already spoken on this issue; the people, the public has spoken, and God has spoken," said Rex Evans, an Ypsilanti resident who belongs to Free Will Baptist Church.
Jayne Rowse and April DeBoer of Hazel Park say the ban on same-sex marriage and a law that bars partners from adopting each other's children unless they are married hurts them and their family. The couple have been unable to adopt each other's children.
"Nothing says family like the marriage license that says that we're legally a family," DeBoer said. "And that's what we're hoping for, and that's what we think we're going to get."
In opening arguments, a lawyer for the women said research has demonstrated conclusively that children do as well with same-sex parents as with heterosexual ones, WZZM-TV reported. Their first witness, a developmental psychologist, said the same thing.
A lawyer for the state said more research needs to be done. The lawyer also argued that Michigan settled the legal question when voters decided almost a decade ago to restrict marriage to heterosexual couples and that can only be changed by another vote.
The trial is expected to last for eight days.
