for their comments and suggestions. I See, e.g., EVELYN Fox KELLER, GENDER AND SCIENCE (1978); Kersti Yllo, Political and Methodological Debates in Wife Abuse Research, in FEMINIST PERSPECTIVES ON WIFE ABUSE (Kersti Yllo & Michele Bograd, eds. 1988); CATHERINE A. MACKINNON, TOWARD A FEMINIST THEORY OF THE STATE 96-101 (1989). 2 The most dramatic example was the Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS) developed by Straus, Gelles and Steinmetz, which counted individual acts of violence without regard for either the severity of the injury or whether they were in self-defense, resulting in a conclusion-known to be false by feminist researchers, shelter workers, and battered women-that husband abuse was as large a problem as wife abuse. See MURRAY A.
This article discusses the variety of ways state legal systems in the United States treat cohabitation, both by same‐sex and heterosexual couples. The different approaches are described along a spectrum that ranges from one extreme, under which cohabitants have essentially no rights against one another or against third parties, to the other extreme, under which cohabitants are to be treated as though they were married under state law. Different areas of law are discussed, including the rights of cohabitants both against one another (remedies upon dissolution, inheritance) and against third parties, such as state benefits, tort claims, health‐related benefits, and rights concerning children. The article concludes with speculations concerning why the remedies offered to cohabitants in the United States are so limited, as compared with other countries.
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