Adams v. Howerton
| Adams v. Howerton | |
|---|---|
| Court | United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit |
| Full case name | Richard Frank Adams, et al., v. Joseph D. Howerton |
| Decided | February 25, 1982 |
| Case history | |
| Prior action | Appeal from the C.D. Cal. |
| Subsequent action | U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari |
| Court membership | |
| Judges sitting | J. Clifford Wallace, Thomas Tang, Howard B. Turrentine |
| Case opinions | |
| Wallace | |
| Keywords | |
| immigration, same-sex marriage | |
Adams v. Howerton, 673 F.2d 1036 (9th Cir. 1982), cert. denied, 458 U.S. 1111 (1982) is a decision from the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that held that the term "spouse" refers to an opposite-sex partner for the purposes of immigration law and that this definition met the standard at the time for rational basis review. It was the first U.S. lawsuit to seek recognition of a same-sex marriage by the federal government.