State, Status, and the American Family Alison Gash and Priscilla Yamin University of Oregon Imagine a world where households have to apply to be considered a family by the state. They would need to document how their domestic grouping fulfills the require- ments of “family” through bank statements, passports, Social Security numbers, and perhaps even recommendations from those in their community attesting to the strength and quality of their relationships or their health and fitness. In reality, this scenario is not as far-fetched as one might think. We contend that family is a status bestowed by the state. The state invokes, imposes, and relies on the family as an instrument of policy implementation and enforcement and as way of organizing and managing a productive society. In disseminating the benefits and protections that hinge on family, the state holds significant autonomy in determining whether certain households will be perceived and treated as families in the eyes of the state. Through the lens of policy debates regarding LGBTQ-headed households, single-mother- headed households, and group homes, we argue the following: concepts of family operate as an arm of the state; as more policies hinge on familyhood, more house- holds seek that determination from the state; and state actors are at once exclusive and inconsistent in granting this status. In all, this suggests that rather than operating only as a matter of individual choice – a way of naming our private relationships – family should also be understood as a state-appointed and -anointed status. Keywords marriage; parent; group home; LGBTQ; welfare; U.S. public policy On August 26, 2015 the Maryland Court of Special Appeals determined that a lesbian mother “did not have parental standing to challenge the denial of visitation or custody” by her son’s biological mother. These two women, who were now divorcing, earlier had not secured either a marriage license prior to their son’s birth or an adoption certificate proving co-parentage. Consequently, although the non- biological mother had helped to choose her son’s biological father (a sperm donor), We thank Patricia Strach, Maxine Eichner, and Ellen Anderson for comments on earlier versions of this article, as well as our fellow symposium contributors for panel discussions and congenial collaboration on the subject of family and politics. We also thank the two anonymous reviewers for Polity for their very helpful comments. Polity, April 2016, Vol. 48(2): 146–164. doi:10.1057/pol.2016.5 © 2016 Northeastern Political Science Association 0032-3497/16 www.palgrave-journals.com/polity/