Married? With Children?

The Civil Partnership Act of 2004 has been in force in the United Kingdom for almost three years. A civil partnership confers on same-sex couples the same mutual rights, benefits, and responsibilities in domestic law as marriage does on spouses, and it gives each civil partner the legal status of being the other’s nearest kin.

There is no legally prescribed form of ceremony for the registration of civil partnerships, but any wording the...

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