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Arizona Surrogacy Law

Arizona statutes prohibit all surrogacy contracts; thereby preventing “baby brokers” and human trafficking in Arizona.  However, if surrogacy occurs, Arizona Revised Statutes, Title 25, Section 218 declares the surrogate as the legal mother who is entitled to custody of the child, and establishes a rebuttable presumption that the surrogate’s husband, if she is married, is the father.  The provision says that no person may enter into or induce, arrange or procure or otherwise assist in the formation of a surrogate parentage contract.  The section defines a surrogate parentage contract as a contract, agreement or arrangement in which a woman agrees to implant an embryo not related to that woman or agrees to conceive a child through natural or artificial insemination and agrees to voluntarily relinquish her parental rights to the child.

In Soos v. Superior Court, 182 Ariz. 470, 473 (Ariz. Ct. App. 1994), the Arizona Court of Appeals considered a surrogacy agreement issue.  There, a husband and wife entered into a surrogacy agreement with another woman and implanted the wife’s eggs that was fertilized by the husband’s sperm into the surrogate woman.  During the pregnancy of the surrogate, the wife sought a divorce including a claim on the unborn child.  The court found that Title 25, Section 218 of the Arizona Revised statute was unconstitutional as it violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the intended mother in surrogacy, while the intended father could establish paternity over the child.  Thus, in Arizona, in counties within the jurisdiction of Appellate Division One, an intended mother is entitled to rebut the presumption that the surrogate is the legal mother of the child born of the surrogacy arrangement.


Inside Arizona Surrogacy Law